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I'niiii llf ih'ili'iil ''(/ Aiii'f. 



THe Proceedings of 

THE WEBvSTER 
CENTENNIAL ^u^ 
U/ye Commemoratiori 
by DartmoutK College 
of tHe Services of 
DANIEL WEBvSTER 
to tHe College and tKe 
vState j^ j^ Held upon 
tHe occasion of U/ye 
One HundredtK Anni 
versary of 6>6e Gradua 
tion of Mr. Webster ^^ 




edited by E-rnest Martin HopKins 
^Secretary to tHe Presiderkt j^ and 
printed under tHe stipervision of 
Homer £l.aton Keyes -^ Instructor 
£.nglisH j^j^j^j^j^j^j^j^ 



in 



MKWHUJllWliLMHIIUIIlilUIPlWgTHM 



p. 



ET-s^vo 



l.^>,~T^ 



\^ 



oi 



U/)e Introduction ^^ 



-\ 



Introduction. 



W 



ITH tlie approacli of the year 1901 the senti- 
ment found general expression among the 
alumni and friends of Dartmouth that the Col- 
lege ought to celebrate in some fitting manner 
the centennial of the graduation of Daniel Webster. 
At a meeting held on January 19th, 1900, the trustees 
passed the following vote : 

"In view of the fact that the Commencement of 
1 90 1 will be the one-hundredth Anniversary of the 
graduation of Daniel Webster, whose supreme service to 
the College in recovering and re-establishing its char- 
tered rights calls for grateful recognition on the part of 
the Sons of Dartmouth : 

"Be it voted that the Centennial of Mr. Webster's 
graduation be observed at Hanover, at such time in the 
year 1901, and in such manner, as may be appropriate, 
to be participated in by the faculty, students, alumni 
and friends of the College." 

If Mr. Webster's only service to the College had 
been that of recovering and re-establishing her chartered 
rights, recognition would still have been called for, 
but it is possible that such recognition might have taken 
a different form from that which was given, and the 
anniversary have been made strictly an academic occa- 
sion. As it was, Mr. Webster's services to the nation 
added such lustre to the name of Dartmouth, and his 

5 



Introdoction personal fame so directly increased the fame of the Col- 
leo-e that it did not seem as feasible to acknowledge the 
debt due to the oT-eat statesman, the loyal alumnus, in 
an academic as in a civic occasion. Thus the event was 
unique, — the observance by a college of the anniversary 
of the oTaduation of one of her sons through a civic 
celebration. 

The preparation for the Centennial v/as entrusted 
to two general committees, one of the trustees, consist- 
ing of the Honorable James B.Richardson, the Honorable 
Benjamin A. Kimball, and Doctor Cecil F. P. Bancroft, 
and one of the faculty, consisting of Professors Justin 
H. Smith, Louis H. Dow, and Frank G. Moore. 

The committee of the trustees made the arrange- 
ment for the speakers at the different exercises, and 
issued the invitations bearing the fac-simile of the auto- 
graph of ]\Ir. Webster, but the chief burden of prepara- 
tion fell upon the local committee. Sub-committees 
were appointed from the faculty to take charge of the 
details incident to the celebration — the design of the 
program and the oversight of the printing, the decora- 
tion of the grounds and the buildings, the electrical dis- 
play, the athletic events, the equipment of the torch-light 
procession, and the entertainment of guests, visitors and 
alumni. The co-operation of the students was inval- 
uable. Special recognition is due Colonel Charles K. Darl- 
ing for his ser\-ices as Marshal throughout the exercises. 
The completion of College Hall gave the requisite 
facilities for the social observance of the occasion. The 
club rooms of the building proved to be exactly fitted for 
the reception of guests and the uses of the \arious com- 
mittees ; the dormitory section added greatly to the con- 



venience of eutertainino^ guests, and the large and stately Introduction 
dining hall, hung with portraits of Mr. Webster, and of 
many of the alumni and benefactors of the College, fur- 
nished a most appropriate setting for the brilliant assem- 
blage gathered at the banquet. 

With the exception of one or two of the earlier 
classes, every class from 1841 was represented. Judge 
Cross, of the class of 1841 was the oldest, and by no 
means the least active, of the graduates present. There 
were present from the class of 185 1, attending the exer- 
cises and observing their fiftieth anniversary, Samuel H. 
Folsom, Esq., Mr. Gilbert E- Hood, Enoch G. Hooke, 
Esq., Senator Redfield Proctor, Mr. Daniel Putnam, Chief 
Justice Jonathan Ross, and Professor Henry E. Sawyer. 
The occasion was made memorable by the presence 
of many guests of personal and official distinction who 
came to do honor to the memory of Mr. Webster. The 
tribute which was paid by their presence and their 
words, representing so great a variety of political opin- 
ions, maybe assumed to express the general estimation in 
which the services of Mr. Webster are held after the 
lapse of one hundred years from the beginning and forty- 
nine years from the close of his career. 

The enjoyment of the occasion was greatly enhanced 
by the weather, unusual even in the rich and mellow 
days of September, which not only made the carrying 
out of the whole program possible, but also gave exhila- 
ration to each event. 



^he Program as issued 

j^ j^ j^ 

CHariges will be noted in tHe 
introduction to eacK section 



Jram j^ of ^he 
W E B vS T E R 
CENTENNIAL of 
DartmoutH Colleg'e 
Celebrating' ^ the 
One -<s^ HundredtK 
Anniversary j£^ j^ 
of S>6e Graduation 
of DANIEL J0^ -^ 
j^ uz^ js^ WE3STER 






September 24tli ®. 25tl\, 1901 
Hanover j0 Ne'W Hampshire 



TUESDAY ^ ^ ^ 
jS^ vSeptember 24tK 

2.30 O'CLOCK -^ 

The faculty and students will assemble in the 
College Yard to form in procession J- J' J- 

3 O'CLOCK JE/ 

EXERCISES IN THE COLLEGE 
CHURCH J- J- J- 

Organ Prelude 

Chorus 

Prayer by the Reverend Samuel Penniman 
Leeds, D. D. 

Chorus 

Address by Professor Charles Francis Richard- 
son, Ph. D., 71 

Mr. Webster's College Life 

Address by Professor John King Lord, 
Ph. D., ^68 

The Development of the College Since 
the Dartmouth College Case 

Chorus 

The Choral music during the week of the Webster Centennial 
will be rendered by students under the direction of Professor 
Charles Henry Morse, Mus. Bac. J^J^^^^^^J^ 

v^ Cr* «^ 

5 O'CLOCK J0' 

A short game of foot ball will be played on 
Alumni Oval by the 'Varsity Eleven 
and an Alumni Eleven J' ^ J' J- ^ J' J' 



TUESDAY js^ j^ js^ 
j^ vSeptember 24tl:i 

8 O'CLOCK j0^ 

^^DARTMOUTH NIGHT'' 

In view of the occasion, Dartmouth Night 
will take the form of an out-door celebration, 
which will open with a torchlight parade, in 
costume, led by the College band and com- 
manded by Colonel Charles Kimball Darling, 
*h^. The faculty will wear black academic 
gowns and mortar-board caps ; the students, 
a similar dress, except that each class will be 
distinguished by a particular color — white for 
the Seniors, blue for the Juniors, scarlet for 
the Sophomores, and yellow for the Freshmen. 
Members of the graduate departments will 
wear the same costume in still different colors. 
The alumni will appear in a Webster cos- 
tume of blue coat, buff waistcoat, stock, dicky 
and tall hat. A feature of the parade will 
be a number of transparencies together with 
several floats, among which will be Webster's 
carriage and his huge plough ^ S ,^ .^ ^ 
After completing its lins of march, the proces- 
sion will assemble in the College Yard, where 
there will be brief speeches, music by the Glee 
Club and the exhibition of a series of stereop- 
ticon views illustrating Webster's life and 
career. Immediately following, the campus 
will be illuminated with electric lights, fire- 
works and a bonfire. A number of prize 
athletic contests will be held, the evening 
closing with the singing of Dartmouth songs 
by the entire assemblage J- J- J' J- J- J- 



WEDNESDAY j^ ^ 
j2/ vSeptember 25tH 



9.30 O'CLOCK -^ 

ASSEMBLAGE IN COLLEGE YARD 

A procession made up of students, alumni, 
faculty, trustees and invited guests will form 
in the College Yard in charge of the Marshal, 
Colonel Charles Kimball Darling, '83 J- J- 

lO O'CLOCK j^ 

EXERCISES IN THE COLLEGE 
CHURCH J^ J- ^ 

Processional "Priest's March from 
Athalie" Mendelssohn 

Chorus "Sanctus in E flat" Osgood 

Prayer by the Reverend Alvah Hovey, D. D., 
'44, Ex-President Newton Theological 
Seminary J* ..* c^ >* ^^ «-* J- J- J- ^ 

Chorus "Prayer of Thanksgiving" 

Old Netherlands (1626) 

Address by the President of the College 

Oration by the Honorable Samuel "Walker 
McCall, '74, of Massachusetts J- J- c^ 

Chorus "Ein Feste Burg" Old German 

Conferring of Honorary Degrees 

The singing by chorus and congregation of 
Milton's pharaphrase of Psalm cxxxvi 

Benediction 



WEDNESDAY ^ ^ 
j2^ vSeptember 25tK 



PSALM 



C X X X VI 



Let OS with a gladsome mind 
Praise the Lord, for He is kind ; 
For His mercies aye endure, 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

Let us blaze His name abroad, 
For of Gods He is the God ; 
For His mercies aye endure. 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

He with all-commanding might 
Filled the new-made world with light ; 
For His mercies aye endure. 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

He His chosen race did bless 
In the wasteful wilderness ; 
For His mercies aye endure. 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

All things living He doth feed. 
His full hand supplies their need ; 
For His mercies aye endure. 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

Let us therefore chorus forth 
His high majesty and worth ; 
For His mercies aye endure, 
Ever faithful, ever sure. 

Amen. 



WEDNESDAY ^ u^ 
js/ vSeptember 25tK 

2.30 O'CLOCK j^ 

CEREMONIES ATTENDING THE 
LAYING OF THE CORNER-STONE 
OF WEBSTER HALL J- J- J- 

The corner-stone will be laid by Samuel Ap- 
pleton, Esq., the. only living grandson of 
Daniel Webster J- ^^^^J-J-c^J- 

The prayer of dedication will be offered by 
the Right Reverend Abiel Leonard, D. D., 
70, Bishop of Utah J- J- J- J- J- J- S- 

Address by the Honorable Frank Swett 
Black, *75, Ex-Governor of New York 

Selections of Music will be rendered by a 
chorus of students J-cf-J-^J'J'J'<:f' 

4 O'CLOCK -^ 

EXERCISES IN THE OLD CHAPEL J- 

Reminiscences of Mr. Webster by some of 
the Older Graduates and Guests 

0.30 O'CLOCK -^ 

Out-of-door Concert by the Salem Cadet Band 




7 O'CLOCK -^ 

BANQUET IN COLLEGE HALL 

On occasion of this, the first public use of 
the Dining Hall, the walls will be hung with 
portraits of Mr. Webster in possession of 
the G)IIege Jt ^ ^ ^ J> ^ J- ^ ^ ^ ^ 

The Honorable Alfred Rtjssell, LL. D., '50, 
will preside jf'j^j^t^t^'^t^'^*^*^ 

Responses will be made by the President of 
the College, and by His Excellency the 
Governor of New Hampshire j* .^ ^ .^ ^ 

Chief-Justice Isaac Newton Blodgett, LL. D., 
of the Supreme Court of the State, will speak 
on Mr. Webster's training at the New Hamp- 
shire Bar ^ The Honorable Frank Palmer 
Goulding, '63, will speak on Mr. Webster at 
the Massachusetts Bar ^ ^ ^ ^ J- ^ .^ 

Some aspects of Mr. Webster's personal life 
and associations will be given by Edwin 
Webster Sanborn, Esquire, '78, the Honorable 
George Fred Williams, '72, and the Reverend 
Edward Everett Hale, D. D. .5^ ^ ^ .5^ .^ 

Professor Francis Brown, LL. D., '70, will 
speak on the relation of President Brown to 
the Dartmouth College Case J- J- J- J- ^ 

The Honorable George Frisbie Hoar, LL. D., 
will speak on Mr. Webster in the Senate <J* 

Chief- Justice Melville Weston Fuller, LL. D., 
(it is expected) will speak of Mr. Webster be- 
fore the Supreme Court J- J- J- J- ^ '^ 



**I would have an inscription over the door 
of your building, ^Founded by Eleazar 
Wheelock, Refounded by Daniel Webster. ' ** 
— Joseph Hopkinson, Esq., to President 
Francis Brown, after the decision of the 
Supreme Court of United States in the 
"Dartmouth CoIIeee Case." 






This program was designed, put into type 
and printed at the office of The Dart- 
mouth Press, Hanover, New Hamp- 
shire, c* J*' J* O* O* c* c* O^ w"* o^ »^ o' 



G>6c E^xercises of 
Tuesday Afternoon 



Program. 

The opening exercises of the Centennial were held at an 
early hour on Tuesday afternoon, anticipating the arrival 
of many of the alumni and guests. The trustees, faculty, 
and students assembled at L30 o*cIock in the College Yard, 
and marched in procession to the College Church. 
Organ Prelude — Festival March, Smart 

Professor Charles Henry Morse, Mus. Bac. 
Chorus — Lift up your Heads, Ye Gates. Luetzet 

Prayer by the Reverend Samuel Penniman Leeds, D. D. 
Address by Professor Charles Francis Richardson, Ph. D.,*7I. 

Mr. Webster's College Life. 
Address by Professor John King Lord, Ph. D., '68. 

The Development of the College Since the 
Dartmouth College Case. 
Chorus — Integer Vitae. Fleming 



Mr. Webster's College Life. 

Address by Professor Charles Francis Richardson, Ph,T>,, '7t . 
r /-^ I NE hundred years ago last winter, at eight o'clock 
L./^.ii *-*" Wednesday evening, the thirty-first of Decem- 
iW3^«J her, a lad of nineteen sat in his college room, 
probably in old Dartmouth, which he jocosely called 
Beechnut Hall, and wrote to his friend Bingham : "To- 
morrow, Hervey, is the first day of the year, and of the cen- 
tury, which none of us will probably live to see closed." 

Ten decades have rolled around, and we meet in the 
first year of another century to celebrate, for the first time 
in the history of American colleges, the graduation of 

2\ 



Charles him whom most we delight to honor at Dartmouth, 
Francis whose "sreat stone face" is car\'ed as that of the chief 
Richardson orator of the new world on the walls of the academic 
theatre of our oldest universit}- ; and whose name was 
but lately selected as entitled to rank with those of 
Washington and Lincoln at the very top of the roll of 
fame of the nation, as preserv^ed in the stately hall of 
learning between the Hudson and the sea. Not alone in 
Dartmouth, therefore, is advanced the claim that Web- 
ster in some respects stands supreme among the alumni 
of the colleges of the United States. It is my modest of- 
fice, in chronological preparation for the more important 
addresses that are to follow, to try to bring before you 
some little picture of Webster's four years in what the 
poet of "Snow-Bound" called "classic Dartmouth's col- 
lege halls." 

The student of history soon discovers how infre- 
quent is the examination of original documents and how^ 
common the re-phrasing of familiar statements. There 
is, in the accounts of Webster's college da3's, as set forth 
by his several biographers, a striking similarity of idea 
and even of word. With minor garnishments of rhetoric, 
we are told, at greater or less length, that his under- 
graduate life was industrious ; that he read more than 
he studied, making, like Shakespeare, greater progress 
in Latin than Greek ; that he excelled in history, ora- 
tory, and English acquirements ; and that he once super- 
intended a " little weekly newspaper." We recognize 
the slippery phrase "it can easily be believed," in its 
changing forms of expression ; and at last we are ready 
to declare the swollen storv, as Dr. Ordronaux said of 
the orations of a living Boanerges of New York politics, 

22 



a " monstrous compound of tautology, redundancy, ver- Charles 
bosity and pleonasm." Francis 

Even the chapter in j\Ir. George Ticknor Curtis' Richardson 
indispensable biography is wordy ; three pages are devot- 
ed to the statement that truth, not exaggeration, should 
be sought in accounts of a great man's youth, and else- 
where there is much that is fanciful, superfluous, or 
irrelevant. I do not propose, in the short time before 
me, to weary 3'ou with iterations so easily to be found 
on the printed page. The later writers have, according 
to the fashion of our time, been the more conservative ; 
but the authorities of chief value, among the many I 
have diligently examined, are the records of the trustees, 
the Phi Beta Kappa, and the United Fraternity ; Web- 
ster's autobiographical notes ; the letters of himself and 
bis college friends, especially those gathered by Professor 
Sanborn when preparing the eulogy delivered at Phillips 
Academy in 1853, and later used in several articles by 
the same hand, on Daniel Webster as a Student ; the 
reminiscences of Judge Samuel Swift of the class of 1800; 
the Dartmouth Gazette and reprints therefrom ; Web- 
ster's two undergraduate orations now in print ; and 
Professor Colby's thorough account of the evolution of 
the Dartmouth curriculum in political science and relat- 
ed subjects. 

If we begin with a glance at externals, the academic 
buildings which Webster beheld during his college quad- 
rennium are brought back to the mind's eye by the water- 
color sketch made by George Ticknor in 1803, at the age 
of eleven. This sketch, now one of our most valued 
memorabilia, represents Dartmouth Hall in its present 
external appearance; southwest, substantially on the 

23 



Charles site of Reed Hall, stands the president's house, long 
Francis since moved across the common, and lately restored as 
Richardson the Howe Library ; in front of the present location of 
Thornton Hall, and near the street, stands the old chapel, 
removed in 1828 to the neighborhood of Hubbard House 
and afterwards pulled to the other side of Main Street 
and transformed into — perhaps I should merely say for 
the first time called — a barn ; while northeast and north- 
west of Dartmouth Hall, respectively, are the house of 
Ebenezer Woodward, the site of which is now shown by 
an abandoned well, and a long two-story wooden struc- 
ture, which served for divers academic and culinary pur- 
poses, near the present chapel site. 

As regards the location of Webster's college rooms, 
I have spent as much time as that devoted to the entire 
remainder of my address in trying to reduce the misty 
stories of a century to something like fact. In Freshman 
and Sophomore years, 1797-99, he roomed in the house 
of Humphrey Farrar, with Farrar's son George, class 
of 1800, and William, class of 1801, and Freeborn 
Adams, non-graduate. This is the written testimony of 
George Farrar.* In 1788 Humphrey Farrar had bought 
of President Wheel ock a lot " with a large house and a 
shop standing thereon," somewhat southeast of the pres- 
ent corner of j\Iain and Lebanon Streets. In 1 793 he 
added thereto an adjoining lot lying north of the lot and 
home " owned and occupied " by him, this new pur- 
chase being the corner at present owned by r^Ir. E. P. 
Storrs. As the record of this purchase was filed Oct. 
14, 1 801 , just prior to Farrar's sale of the whole propert)^ 

•George Farrar to Prof. E. D. Sanborn, Nov. 25, 1S52.— Private 
Correspondence of Daniel Webster, I : 53. 

24 



the inference is clear that Webster roomed in a house Charles 
situated thereon, during Freshman and Sophomore years. Francis 
For this interesting discovery I am indebted to the pains- Richardson 
taking search made for me by George H. Kendall, Esq., 
Register of Deeds of Grafton County. It is probable 
that the fabric of this Farrar house survives, at least 
in part, as the existing Wainwright house. For Webster's 
abode in Junior and Senior years three localities are 
named, none of which can be reduced to accurate time- 
limits. The late j\Iiss Lucy J. McMurphy was told by 
William Dewey, about 1850, that to his knowledge 
Webster roomed in the McMurphy house, time not speci- 
fied ; and she wrote in 1896 that she thought Dewey said 
that Webster occupied the south chamber. * In Junior 
year he continued to room with Freeborn Adams, and 
for the greater part of some one year he roomed with 
Aaron Loveland of his own class. Judge Loveland's 
nephew, Mr. Charles Ensworth, now living in Norwich, 
thinks they roomed in the house of the father of the 
William Dewey already named, who, after Webster's col- 
lege days, built the present home of Mrs. Frederick 
Chase, but had, perhaps, previously occupied another 
house on the same site. In Senior year, according to 
tradition, and the oral statement made to Dean Emerson 
by Professor Sanborn of the class of 1832, Webster 
roomed in Dartmouth Hall. A more specific tradition 
declares that he occupied the room then and now num- 
bered i, northwest corner of the third story, as was 
understood by my father, Moses Charles Richardson of 
the class of 1841, who was its occupant 1 840-1, and by 

* Letter filed in the College library. 

25 



Charles Dean Emerson of the class of 1868, who was its occu- 
Francis pant 1865-7. 
Richardson Webster wrote from Washington, Feb. 5, 1849, to 

James H. Bingham as "my dear old class-mate, room- 
mate, and friend," but no such expression as "room- 
mate" is contained in his letters to Bingham during or 
immediately after their college course, though the two 
were intimate associates. It is probable, from this allu- 
sion, from George Farrar's testimony, and from Aaron 
Loveland's recollection, that a somewhat loose system of 
tneum and tuum^ in the matter of rooms, was in vogue 
in the early and simple days of the College. 

The triennial catalogues of graduates of the College 
began in 1786, but the first annual list of the officers 
and students of " Dartmouth University " — which term 
was habitually used by the authorities years before it 
became the badge of the opposing party in the great 
contest — was issued in October, 1802, a year after Web- 
ster's graduation. The little company of instructors — a 
president and three men in the College, and one in the 
medical school — given in the general catalogue of 1801, 
was the same, save as regards two tutors, with which 
Webster had been familiar in his student days. The 
extent of the wisdom of the teachers reminds one of 
Italian versatility in the time of Leonardo. Honorable 
John Wheelock, LL. D., was president and professor of 
civil and ecclesiastical history ; Honorable Bezaleel 
Woodward, A. M., was professor of mathematics, natur- 
al philosophy, and ethics, and also trustee and treasurer, 
and judge of the county court ; Rev. John Smith, A.]\I., 
was trustee and librarian and likewise professor of "Lat- 
in, Greek, Hebrew, and other oriental languages"; and 

26 



Nathan Smith, M. D., besides being teacher of the Charles 
theory and practice of medicine and of anatomy and Francis 
surgery, was professor of chemistry. The tutors had Richardson 
been John Noyes (afterwards a member of Congress for 
a single term) from 1797 to 1799; Stephen Beniis (later 
a minister in Massachusetts) from 1799 to 1800; and 
Roswell Shirtliff, as he then spelled his name, from 
1800. Wheelock, Woodward, John Smith, and the suc- 
cessive tutors were Webster's instructors ; and it should 
be said of the last-named down-trodden class that their 
usefulness in personal contact with students, while pur- 
suing their multifarious duties of teaching everything 
that the professors left untouched or did not know, was 
an important factor in the history of American colleges 
prior to 1850. 

The reminiscences of some of these men by Judge 
Samuel Swift of Middlebury, of the class of 1800, who 
lived to be the oldest graduate of the college, are vivid : 
"President Wheelock's instructions were confined to the 
Senior class, and he was not regarded by them as a 
popular or profitable teacher. His knowledge and his 
instructions were mostly confined to the book. He was 
much of a recluse, and mingled little in public or pri- 
vate with the world, and seemed to know little of it. 
He affected a stiff dignity towards the students, and in 
all his movements ; his walks abroad, across the com- 
mon or elsewhere, with his three-cornered hat, were in 
slow and measured steps. The library was kept in one 
of the rooms of the upper story (of Dartmouth Hall), 
and was said, on what authority I do not know, to con- 
tain about 4,000 volumes. A considerable proportion 
of them were duodecimos, and other small volumes con- 

27 



Charles tributed, I suppose, by friends who had no further use 
Francis for them. The books seemed not to be selected because 
Richardson they were particularly appropriate for a college library. 
In another upper room was what was called a museum, 
consisting of curiosities said to be collected by former 
graduates and others in their travels. The most notice- 
able, and the only one I recollect, was a stuffed skin of 
a large fowl, understood to be found in South America. 
On one occasion the building caught fire. The flames 
were making decided progress, when President Wheel- 
ock, appearing in the excited crowd, called to a student 
to secure 'the Great Bird'. By the vigorous application 
of snow, however, the fire was at length subdued and 
the building and most of its contents rescued. John Smith, 
Professor of Greek and Latin — known among the students 
as Professor Johnny — was an amiable man, but of formal 
manners. He was a critical book-scholar, but an arti- 
ficial teacher. He preached also on the Sabbath to the 
students and villagers, but with little animation or force 
in his composition or delivery. Bezaleel Woodward . . . 
was in everything the reverse of President Wheelock 
and Professor Smith . , . There was nothing scholastic 
about his appearance or manners." 

The instruction proffered at Dartmouth, at the 
time, may have deserved the adjective "meagre", so 
often used by Webster's biographers, but it was at least 
logically progressive, and some of the teachers were 
strong men. It is a hasty error to assume that the cur- 
riculum of American colleges, a century ago, was not 
much better than that of a good high school of to-day. 
Latin was taught with some approach to thoroughness ; 
quotations from classical authors were still heard from 

28 



undero-raduate lips ; and mature young men got sound Charles 
discipline from the philosophical, the semi-philosophi- Francis 
cal, or even the theological subjects set before them in Richardson 
the class-room. The College library was miserably 
scanty, but the English rhetoricians of the eighteenth 
century — headed by Addison with his poetical prose and 
Pope with his prosy verse — were influential upon the 
student because so closely connected with the Roman 
classicism of the daily recitation. If Webster knew less 
Greek than Latin, it must be remembered that every- 
where in America, prior to 1800, Greek was viewed 
through a Latin haze and was much less competently 
taught. 

But we naturally ask, with peculiar interest : What 
instruction did Webster receive in legal and political 
studies ? Says Professor Colby, in his account of the 
early curriculum at Dartmouth, aside from ancient 
languages, mathematics, and religious branches : "The 
location of the College on the frontier, and the stirring 
events which followed its founding, the Revolution, the 
framing of the new constitutions, state and federal, the 
long struggle over the New Hampshire grants, and the 
rise of American political parties, aroused liveliest inter- 
est in law and government throughout all the region 
where dwelt the natural constituency of the College, and 
made increasing demand upon it for legal and political 
training. Evidence of effort to satisfy this demand may 
be found in the first formal curriculum of the College, 
which was adopted by its trustees in 1796. This, under 
the head of 'Public and Classical Exercises', enumerates 
among the subjects of study for Juniors, ' natural and 
moral philosophy', and among those for Seniors, 'natur- 

29 



Charles al and politic law'. Since moral philosophy, as then 
Francis defined, treated of the state — the subject-matter of polit- 
Richardson ical science — the first formal curriculum of the College 
appears to have included both the studies of law and 
government. Neither search in the official records of 
the College, nor wide gleaning among the graduates of 
that period, yields much information about the conduct 
of these courses from 1796 to 1822. Instruction in 
natural and politic law apparently fell, with the general 
care of the Senior class, to the President, and so was 
given to John Wheelock from 1796 to 1815 . . . The in- 
struction in moral philosophy (including political phi- 
losophy) apparently was assigned, with the general care 
of the Junior class, to Rev. John Smith, Professor of the 
Latin and Greek languages from 1796 to 1804 . . . Proba- 
bly the earliest text-books in each of these subjects were 
those known to have been in use in 1816. These were 
the two famous works, Burlamarqui's Principles of Nat- 
ural and Politic Law, first published in Geneva in 1747 
and republished in Boston as early as 1793, and Paley's 
Moral and Political Philosophy, first published in 
England in 1785 and republished in Boston as early as 
1795. The sixth book of Paley is devoted to what is 
now called political science — the state, its origin, forms 
of government, civil liberty, and the administration of 
justice. Both of these books were then coming into use 
in America, and the former was prescribed as a text in 
the college as late as 1828, and the latter as late as 
1838." 

To tlie institution thus housed, officered and 
arranged, Webster came as a Freshman in August, 1797, 
having studied a little at Exeter and received his final 

30 



preparation from Rev. Samuel Wood, a graduate of Charles 
1779, for fifty- five years pastor at Boscawen. When his Francis 
father first told him he was to go to college, " the very Richardson 
idea," he afterwards said, "thrilled my whole frame." 
He had quickly read the stipulated three or four orations 
of Cicero and four or five books of Virgil, and spent only 
three months over the Greek Testament. One writer 
says that Daniel's admission was due less to his own 
acquirements than to Mr. Wood's influence as a trustee, 
which remark does not lead us into an investigation of 
the potentiality of the trustees, as Mr. Wood did not 
belong to their honorable body. Webster reached Han- 
over in a stage with Junior Roswell Shurtleff, who 
(according to the memory of his daughter, the late INIrs. 
Susan Brown) showed him attention and escorted 
him for quarters to the house now occupied by Dr. 
Leeds, then, like so many country houses of the time, a 
sort of inn. Dr. Shurtleff, who remembered him well 
in his college days as thin, dark, and pale, slept in the 
same room with him the first night. Rumor declares 
that Webster passed his entrance examinations in the 
same house. In Freshman year he studied Latin(begin- 
ning with book VH of the Aeneid), Greek (New Testa- 
ment), arithmetic and algebra. He joined the United 
Fraternity Nov. 7, 1797, which society met in his room 
Nov. 21. He was elected by it " inspector of books" 
Aug. 12, 1798. 

In Sophomore year he is said to have delivered an 
oration on a deceased class-mate, and to have given a 
poem before the class, every line of which ended in /on, 
no very difficult metrical task. In the winter of 1797 
and 1798 he taught school in his home town of Salis- 



Charles bury, the first year for four dollars a month and the 
Francis second year for six. May 14, 1799, he was elected Fra- 
Richardson ternity librarian and member of the standing committee. 
In Junior year and the following he wrote anony- 
mously, or as '' Icarus," for the Dartmouth Gazette^ a 
general, not collegiate, weekly, published in Hanover 
by Moses Davis, also making selections for the paper. 
Davis issued the first number of this Gazette^ which 
was at least the third Hanover paper, " on the College 
plain, west of the ]\Ieeting-House, Hanover, Newhamp- 
shire," on Aug. 27, 1799, and published it until his 
death in July, 1806, also issuing a small fortnightly 
called the Literary Tablet, "by Nicholas Orlando," 
from 1803 to 1806. Webster's contributions were pretty 
regular, from the initial number, for the first two years 
of the paper, which were the last of his college course. 
As far as preserved, they do not differ from the usual 
newspaper verse and prose of the period ; the pentam- 
eters are of the one two, three four, hve six, seven 
eight nine ten order ; sentiment is enforced by capitali- 
zation ; jocosity is rather too roomy ; and the glories of 
peace are properly commended at the expense of the 
horrors of war. The cleverest of them is a scheme for 
a Napoleonic subjugation of the inhabitants of the moon. 
For his work, which Davis was always glad to get, 
Webster received some $50 or $75, enough, as he remem- 
bered, to pay a year's board in those frugal days. Davis 
wrote from Hanover, Nov. 26, 1802, with a jocose per- 
sistency which brooked no denial, demanding from 
Webster a "newsboy's message" for January, 1803. 
" I want," said he, " a genuinely Federal address, and 
you are the very man to write it," adding, "some of 

32 



our most respectable characters join in this request. It Charles 
is conjectured that ' Icarus ' has flocked with the wild Francis 
geese and gone vSouth for a wanner climate. It is, Richardson 
however, expected he will return early in the spring." 
This " newsboy's message," we are told, was written as 
his last contribution to the paper. I regret that I have 
failed to find it. After Davis' death the Gazette passed 
into the hands of Charles Spear, who conducted it until 
1819 as a judicious Federalist organ, and during the 
college-university contest, as an advocate of the college 
party. The latest known issue is that for June 23, 18 19. 
To return to Webster as a college Junior : Oct. 15, 
1799, the Fraternity voted to " reposite " in its annals 
an oration delivered by him, the manuscript of which 
was afterwards stolen. Nov. 26, 1799, Webster gave a 
voluntary oration, and Dec. 3, an assigned oration, 
before the Fraternity. Dec. 17, possibly on Webster's 
suggestion. Printer Moses Davis was elected an honorary 
member. May 27, 1800, Webster was chosen vice- 
president. Aug. 19 he was elected orator and "first 
critic," his place as orator preceding that of other offi- 
cers, president, etc., chosen at the same time. Aug. 20, 
1799, he and Joseph W. Brackett had been asked to 
write a " dialogue for exhibition at the next Commence- 
ment." This seems to have been presented at the end 
of his Junior year, in the College church, then more 
histrionically hospitable than now. The Fraternity had 
voted to give a play every year at that period, but a 
subsequent vote discontinued the custom after one trial; 
we are not told whether the reason was that the dialogue 
was inimitable or that it was intolerable. 



33 



Charles Webster's membership in the Phi Beta Kappa so- 

Francis ciety is made interesting: by the fact that the records of 
Richardson four of its meetings are in his handwriting as secretary 
pro tem. He had been elected, June 5, 1800, and he 
was initiated, as the only incomer, July 3. This was 
glory enough for one meeting, so the society "voted to 
omit the exercises till next week on Thursday." 

Aug. 26, 1800, Rev. ]\Ir. Wood, his former tutor, 
was elected an honorary member of the Fraternity, 
doubtless at Webster's suggestion. Oct. 7, Ephraim 
Simonds gave a Fraternity oration on the Beauties of 
Friendship, and Webster one on Ambition. Simonds 
died June 18, 1801, and Webster subsequently delivered 
a commemorative oration on his class-mate and friend. 
Nov. 25, Webster was elected president of the Fraternity. 
On Wednesday, Aug. 27, 1801, he received his bache- 
lor's degree. 

Turning from the chronological to the general, we 
must never forget that in all our consideration of Web- 
ster's college course, we are concerned with the being 
and doing of a boy between fifteen and nineteen years, 
who left Dartmouth at an age about that of the "average 
man" of the present incoming Freshman class. On the 
whole, his career as an undergraduate bore some resem- 
blance to that of Emerson and Hawthorne at other New 
England institutions, in that he read much, Init did not 
seek or reach the highest academic honors. This is a 
common, perhaps the usual, experience of those to whom 
technical scholarship does not strongly appeal. As an 
orator he made an unusual mark, as is proved by the 
common testimony of his associates ; by his selection as 
Fourth-of-July speaker before the citizens of Hanover in 

34 



i8oo ; and by his appearance as the commemorative enlo- Charles 
p^ist of his class-mate Simonds. rrancis 

Says Webster himself, in his fragmentary autobiog- •^'cnaroson 
raphy, " Of my college life I can say but little. I was 
graduated, in course, in August, 1801. Owing to some 
difficulties, haec non meminissc juvat^ I took no part in 
the Commencement exercises. I spoke an oration to 
the Society of the United Fraternity, which I suspect 
was a sufficiently boyish performance. My college life 
was not an idle one. Besides the regular attendance of 
prescribed duties and studies, I read something of English 
history and English literature. Perhaps my reading was 
too miscellaneous. I even paid my board for a year by 
superintending a little weekly newspaper, and making 
selections for it from books of literature, and from the 
contemporary publications. I suppose I sometimes 
wrote a foolish paragraph myself. While in college I 
delivered two or three occasional addresses, which were 
published. I trust they are forgotten ; they were in 
very bad taste. I had not then learned that all true 
power in writing is in the idea, not in the style, an 
en'or into which the ars rhetorica^ as it is usually taught, 
may easily lead stronger heads than mine." 

Professor Sanborn once said to him at his own 
table in Franklin : " It is commonly reported . . . that 
you did not study much in college." He raised his 
eyebrows very high and replied with spirit : " What 
fools they must be to suppose that anybody could suc- 
ceed in college or public life without study ! I studied 
and read more than all the rest of my class, if they had 
all been made into one man. And I was as much 
above them then as I am now." This is the sort of 

35 



Charles indignant egotism into whicli the really great man occa- 
Francis sionally breaks, and we pardon him. But at another 
Richardson time he wrote : "My scholarship was overestimated. 
. . . IManv other students read more than I did and 
knew more than I did. But so much as I read I made 
mv own. . . . Thus greater credit was given me for 
extensive and accurate knowledge than I really pos- 
sessed." To George Ticknor he once remarked : " ]\Iy 
Greek and mathematics were not great while I was in 
college, but I was better read in history and English 
generally than any of my class, and I was good in com- 
position. My Latin was pretty strong too." The year 
before his death he wrote: "My attainments, if I 
made any, were not such as told for much in the recita- 
tion room. After leaving college I 'caught up', as the 
boys say, pretty well in Latin ; but in college, and after- 
ward, I left Greek to Loveland and mathematics to Shat- 
tuck. Would that I had pursued my Greek till I could 
read and understand Demosthenes in his own language." 
One writer has expressed surprise that the modern 
Demosthenes did not excel as a Hellenist. I would say 
that the Demosthenian element in Webster was furnished 
by his Saxon inwit and the Ciceronian by his Roman 
studies, did I not remember that Cicero was in some 
ways a more modern and facile man than Webster him- 
self. Were Webster and Cicero to re-appear in Ameri- 
can political life, Webster would be the mightier in dis- 
cussing the question whether the Constitution follows 
the flag, but Cicero would ])e the more serviceable in 
finding a remedy for municipal maladministration. 

One of Mr. Webster's most careful biographers 
thinks that he lacked " close, steady, and disinterested 

36 



attention." It wonld seem, however, that his study of Charles 
history, as a collegian, and his obvious correlation of Francis 
Hume and Gibbon witli liis class-room work in Ivatin Richardson 
and practical philosophy, proved the contrary. Let us 
not fall into the too prevalent habit of guesswork when 
we aver that the known productions of Webster, in the 
years immediately following his graduation, are so close- 
ly connected with the academic fashions of 1801 as to 
suggest an inevitable relation of cause to effect. The 
new work of romanticism, introduced to English readers 
by Coleridge and Wordsworth's "Lyrical Ballads" of 
1798, was as yet unknown at Dartmouth, where Cole- 
ridge was soon to be a philosophic power ; and Webster 
as collegian — indeed to the end of his days — was an 
exponent of the grandeur that was Rome rather than the 
glory that was Greece. A full and eloquent expansion 
of this fact you have read for yourselves in Choate's 
resplendent eulogy, perhaps the most famous speech ever 
delivered from this memory-haunted platform. 

"Black Dan" as a collegian — he was mistaken by 
one of the Hanover Deweys for an Indian entering the 
Moor School his first Sunday in the College church — 
was impressive as a mighty man in the moulding 
process ; a potent figure, spare, with high cheek-bones, 
storm-tossed eyes, a resonant voice, and a dignity of 
carriage that was notinconsistent with the hearty humor 
of a certain good-fellowship. But there have comedown 
to us no stories such as those of Hawthorne's mild play- 
ing for stakes at Bowdoin, Poe's heavier gambling at 
the L'f^niversity of Virginia, or Emerson's utter incapaci- 
ty for mathematics at Harvard. If Webster indulged in 
discreet flirtations, which are the subject of jocose allu- 

37 



Charles sions in his letters of the time, they evidently left him, 
Francis and the voung women mentioned, heart-free. You will 
Richardson also be glad to learn that if, as one of his biographers dis- 
creetly puts it, "there was gaiety in the little town of 
Hanover in those days," it was, he says, "of that modest 
and moderate sort which consisted with the habits of 
learning, and of a religious community." 

The testimony of his college mates, even when we 
make allowance for the natural tendency to magnify a 
great man's early virtues and to minimize his faults, is 
consistent. vSays one of them: "I should as soon have sus- 
pected John Wheelock,the President, of improper conduct 
as Daniel Webster ... He was dignified, constant, well- 
prepared, industrious; read with rapidity ; a good general 
scholar ; unequalled in composition and speaking ; a 
talented debater ; was accustomed to arrange his thoughts 
in his mind in his room or private walks, and put them 
upon paper just before the exercise was called for. Once 
a sudden flaw of wind took away his paper, and it was 
last seen flying over the meeting-house, but he went in 
and spoke its contents with remarkable fluency. He 
always attended public worship," a commendable trait 
that, with the connivance of the College authorities, has 
characterized the Dartmouth man ever since. Another 
witness avers that he was the " most remarkable young 
man in College ; no one thought of equalling the vigor 
and glow of his eloquence ; his habits and moral character 
were entirely unimpeachable." Said one of his class- 
mates : "If anything difhcult was to be done, the task 
was laid upon Webster." Another recalls that " the 
powers of his mini were remarkably displayed by the 
compass and force of his arguments in extemporaneous 

38 



debates at the meetings of the literary society. At that Charles 
early day, the clearness of his reasonings, connected Francis 
with his aspect and manner, produced an almost irresist- Richardson 
ble impression upon his hearers. His large, black , pierc- 
ing eye, peering out under dark, overhanging brows ; 
his broad, intellectual forehead ; the solemn tones of his 
voice ; the dignity of his mien, with an earnestness by 
which he seemed to throw his whole great soul into his 
subject, evincing the sincerity of his belief that the cause 
he advocated was that of truth and justice, all these 
created a power of eloquence which few could resist." 
George Farrar adds, in Johnsonian style, that " he was 
pleasant without ostentation." 

"He was sure," says Hervey Bingham, a lifelong 
friend , "to understand the subject of his recitation ; some- 
times, I used to think, in a more extended and more 
comprehensive sense than his teachers . . . He was a 
favorite with the class generally; interesting and instruct- 
ive in conv^ersation ; social and verv kind in his feel- 
ings ; not intimate with many." "All his exercises," 
according to his class-mate Elisha Hotchkiss, "through 
his whole collegiate course, improved in excellence as 
time advanced . . . His range of study was more general 
than that of his class-mates. The ease with which he 
acquired knowledge afforded him much time for promis- 
cuous reading." His mode of recitation, according to 
the recollection of Nathaniel Shattuck, also of the class 
of 1801, "was prompt and off-hand ; ever standing side 
by side with the best specimens of scholarship in his 
class, and in some particulars, especially in compositon 
and oratory, ahead of them all , . . He possessed a very 
clear and comprehensive mind, and on graver subjects 

39 



Charles was bold and lion-like in lano:uage." A minor but not 
Francis universally prevalent merit is mentioned by Professor 
Richardson Sanborn in the remark that "all the early manuscripts 
of Daniel and Ezekiel Webster are remarkable for their 
plain, legible chirography, with scarcely a blot or era- 
sure, and for their accurate spelling and punctuation." 
Samuel Lorenzo Knapp, of the class of 1804, who 
was the first to write a history of American literature 
and a life of Webster, says in the latter that there was 
no mannerism or reigning fashion in the democratic 
Dartmouth of Webster's day, no uniformity of coats, 
caps, or thoughts," but that, in his rather remarkable 
phrase, "the alumni exhibited a wilderness of free minds, 
over whom alma mater had no other control than the 
exactions of a respectful compliance to a few necessary 
rules in order to secure the ordinary duties of a student. 
:\Ir. Webster was distinguished in his class for a general 
knowledge of all the branches of learning taught in the 
College, but much more for a bold, strong, independent 
manner of thinking and of expressing his opinions. He 
grappled with authors at that time not simply to make 
himself master of what they wrote, but to test their 
merits by a standard of his own. If such a mind is not 
always right in its conclusions it is certainly on the road 
to truth . . . The scholars acknowledged his great talents 
and the faculty sanctioned their opinion of his merits. 
The professor of natural philosophy. Judge Woodward, 
who lived but three years after Mr. Webster left College, 
often spoke of him in high terms, and accompanied his 
remarks with a confident prophecy of his future emi- 
nence. 'That man's victory is certain,' said the sage 
professor, 'who reaches the heart through the medium 

40 



of the understanding. He gained me by combating my Charles 
opinions, for I often attacked him merely to try his Francis 
strength.' The good old professor," adds Knapp, "was Richardson 
then in the wane of life, but if his struggles with his 
pupils lacked something of his former energy (for he 
was in the prime of life a strong man, and had but few 
equals in the field of argument), still there was such a 
sincerity in his opinion, and so much of his former 
insight into character remained, that all were prepared 
to expect and believe his visions of coming days." I 
fear that Professor Woodward was not the last Dartmouth 
instructor who had to "struggle" with his pupils as 
they "exhibited a wilderness of free minds." 

There is a little more of the sub-acid in the recol- 
lections of his room-mate Aaron Loveland of Norwich, 
Vermont, who survived until 1870. A living resident 
of that town, a nephew of Judge Loveland, says that he 
often heard his mother or grandmother tell about the 
Judge's bringing Mr. Webster to the Loveland home- 
stead, when they were in College, on Saturdays to hunt. 
Webster was rather rough and awkward in his manners, 
and troubled the grandmother by so putting his feet 
upon the soft soapstone around the fireplace as to scratch 
it ; and so she told Aaron not to bring his friend any 
more if he was going to scratch her Orford soapstone. 
On a July afternoon in 1857, thirteen years before his 
death. Judge Loveland sat down in a hay field west of 
Norwich and gave to Rev. S. W. Boardman, then the 
village pastor, some reminiscences of Webster's college 
days, which Mr. Boardman immediately jotted down. 
" I roomed with Webster," said he, "about one year. 



4( 



Charles He was very ambitious in college from the first, and 
Francis took every opportunity to make himself conspicuous. 
Richardson He had unbounded self-confidence, seemed to feel that 
a good deal belonged to him, and evidently intended to 
be a great man in public life. He was rather bombas- 
tic and always ready for a speech. One day he was 
reading Addison's 'Cato,' putting it off in great style, 
when he pronounced 'Utica' as if the first letter was 
short; I corrected him, and he said I was right. He 
did a great deal in his college society, and received al- 
most unbounded flattery from his fellow-members. They 
thought he was great. It was common for others to say 
they overestimated him. He was not very popular with 
the class, owing to his being so independent and assum- 
ing. On one occasion, when some matter was discussed 
before the class, the side which he advocated received 
but few votes, whereupon he got up and left the room. 
He would appear rather stuffy if things did not go to 
suit him, though he took no special pains at electioneer- 
ing. On the whole, he was regarded as our ablest 
man ; if anything was to be done he was generally ap- 
pointed. He never refused; would always take hold 
and get off something, and generally did well. His funer- 
al oration for Simonds was very good, but produced no 
extraordinary effect. He came to college from a tavern 
kept by his father, who was in embarrassed circumstances. 
His father was at our room while we were together. He 
said that if he had received education in youth, he could 
have done anything he chose. Dan was rough and awk- 
ward, verv decidedlv, and I sometimes doubted whether 
he would succeed in life on that account. Yet there 
was something rather assuming and pompous in his 

42 



bearing as well as his style. He observed things remark- Charles 
ably, and was quick to see their bearings. He was, and Francis 
felt himself to be, a kind of oracle. He read the news- Richardson 
papers and kept himself posted upon political affairs 
remarkably for a young man. He read a good deal also 
of • general reading. If any distinguished men were 
about, he would manage to fall in with them ; met more 
than most students, and was distinguished, in the com- 
munity around the College, for the extent and readiness 
of his political knowledge. He was a good, though not 
a very accurate, scholar. He would occasionally come 
over here to Norwich, Saturdays, to hunt with me. Dan 
seldom hit anything. He became precisely the man to 
be the pet of merchants. He was ambitious through 
life, and did well till the last, when he foolishly sought 
the Southern vote. He ought to have known that he 
would never secure it. He had spoken too much and 
too well against slavery for them ever to forget or for- 
give. I consider ambition his one fault and weakness." 
On another occasion. Judge Loveland said that he 
often walked and talked with Webster, and that his con- 
versation was philosophical or political, far above the 
ordinary gossip of other young men. 

Webster got no small amount of practice in speech- 
making in the United Fraternity, so often mentioned. 
It was one of the two rival societies among the students, 
the regular exercises of which consisted of essays, de- 
bates, and orations of the sort so long common in New 
England colleges and country "lyceums." Thus W^eb- 
ster shared or increased undergraduate wisdom on the 
following questions, among others (I quote from the 
records) : "Would it be good policy to treat an individ- 

43 



Charles ual of the French nation with that respect we should one 
Francis of another, in present circumstances?" " Would it be 
Richardson just for the United States to grant letters of Mark and 
Reprisal against the French Republic ?" "Should a 
scholar attend as much to ancient as modern writings ?" 
"Is the study of the Latin language preferable to Greek?' ' 
and so on. The records sometimes append "yes" or 
"no" to perpetuate the opinion of the members as ex- 
pressed in the subsequent vote. An unhesitating affirm- 
ative gave the Dartmouth view of the query, " Is mar- 
riage productive of happiness?" and even, " Is a collegi- 
ate education conducive to happiness?"; but the more 
guarded word "conditional" was appended to the still- 
mooted inquiry, "Ought separate schools to be provided 
for the education of the different sexes?" 

The books of the society show the usual dreary 
memorials of insecure undergraduate orthography, lazy 
secretaries, speakers unprepared, exercises postponed, 
small attendance, and fines ; but Webster, who gradual- 
ly became its most important member, was always ready, 
and once gave a volunteer oration the very week before 
a regular one was duly delivered by him. 

Two of Webster's undergraduate speeches survive 
in print: this eulogy of his class-mate Simonds, and his 
Fourth of July, 1800, oration before the citizens of Han- 
over. Of the former, however genuine its feeling and 
sincere its endeavor, the modern reader shares the au- 
thor's deprecatory opinion. A funeral oration that is 
not verbose and platitudinous is rare indeed; great would 
have been the saving of words and of patience if more 
of the dead had been allowed to bury their own dead. 
That the Johnsonian style was still potent is shown by 

44 



such an aspiration as, "May his virtues ever live in our Charles 
practice, as his memory ever must in our minds"; while Francis 
the vogue of Mackenzie, the "Man of Feeling," is sug- Richardson 
gested by the remark that "little, indeed, is he fitted 
to cull the flowers of rhetoric, whose bosom still bleeds 
for the loss of its inmate, whose powers are overwhelmed 
in the flood of sensibility." But not unworthy was 
such a phrase as "the dull, funeral toll," or the well- 
balanced sentence : "He has entered the innermost of 
the temple of eternity, and left us treading in the vesti- 
bule." A local touch is : "He walks not the aisles of 
yonder building" — Dartmouth Hall being the only one 
to be mentioned; and as we stroll in our beautiful grave- 
yard we may recall that it has been commemorated in 
such sonorous words as these: "All of him that was 
mortal now lies in the charnels of yonder cemetery. By 
the grass that nods over the mounds of Sumner, Merrill, 
and Cook, now rests a fourth son of Dartmouth, con- 
stituting another monument of man's mortality. The 
sun, as it sinks to the ocean [sic], plays its departing 
beams on his tomb, but they re-animate him not. The 
cold sod presses on his bosom, his hands hang down in 
weakness. The bird of evening shouts a melancholy 
air on the poplar, but her voice is stillness to his ears." 
The stones of Sumner, Merrill, Cook, and Simonds still 
stand side by side in the older part of our "dead man's 
garden"; that of Simonds was set up by the United 
Fraternity soon after his death. 

The most salient and illustrating event of Webster's 
whole college career was the Fourth of July oration de- 
livered in the closing year of the eighteenth century be- 
fore the citizens of Hanover, With all its faults, it was, 

45 



Charles and it remains, an interesting anticipation of the vital 
Francis belief and life-work of the greatest American orator, 
Richardson concerning a thing that was destined to be profonndly 
connected with the struggles of the next seventy-five 
years : the nature and powers of the Federal Union of 
states of the western world. In this microcosm we have 
in a crude form several of the future orator's most 
prominent qualities : his mingling of Latin derivatives 
with old English words ; his balanced periods, alter- 
nating with language of straight-forward simplicity ; 
and, above all, an occasional suggestion of that power 
in which he surpasses Demosthenes, Cicero, and Burke, 
the power of making the very point under discussion 
seem so axiomatic as to render debate almost superfluous. 
Webster was afterward ashamed of some of the bathetic 
passages in this speech, which would certainly be ob- 
noxious to the blue pencils of our instructors in rhetoric 
in the Dartmouth of to-day. The "gasconading pilgrim 
of Egypt" was naturally a bugaboo in the dawning cen- 
tury, and the embrace of France, which, "not yet sa- 
tiated with the contortions of expiring republics," had 
"spouted her fury across the Atlantic," was death; 
therefore the young orator proffered, as his final question 
and answer, the startling query: "Shall we pronounce 
the sad benediction to Freedom, and immolate liberty 
on the altar our fathers had raised to her ! No ! The 
response of a nation is, no! Let it be registered on the 
archives of Heaven: ere the religion we profess, and 
the privileges we enjoy, are sacrificed at the shrines of 
despots and demagogues let the pillars of creation 
tremble! Let world be wrecked on world, and sys- 
tems rush to ruin !" But other parts of the speech are 

46 



significant in a different way. The eulogist of the Pil- Charles 
grim Fathers is foreshadowed in this passage : "We be- Francis 
hold a feeble band of colonists, engaged in the arduous Richardson 
undertaking of a new settlement in the wilds of North 
America. Their civil liberty being mutilated, and the 
enjoyment of their religious sentiments denied them in 
the land that gave them birth, they fled their country, 
they braved the dangers of the then almost unnavigated 
ocean, and sought on the other side the globe an asylum 
from the iron grasp of tyranny and the more intolerable 
scourge of ecclesiastical persecution." And the Adams 
and Jefferson speech seems anticipated in these words of 
the boy of eighteen : "The solemn Declaration of Inde- 
pendence is now pronounced, amidst crowds of admir- 
ing citizens, by the supreme council of our nation, and 
received with the unbounded plaudits of a grateful peo- 
ple. That was the hour when patriotism was proved, 
when the souls of men were tried. It was then, ye ven- 
erable patriots, it was then you stretched the indignant 
arm, and unitedly swore to be free. Despising such 
toys as subjugated empires, you then knew no middle 
fortune between liberty and death. Firmly relying on 
the patronage of Heaven, unwarped in the resolution 
you had taken, you then, undaunted, met, engaged, de- 
feated the gigantic power of Britain, and rose trium- 
phant over the ruins of your enemies. Trenton, Prince- 
ton, Bennington, and Saratoga were the successive 
theatres of your victories, and the utmost bounds of 
creation are the limits to your fame." This is Web- 
sterian English ; nor is it too much to say that we also 
hear the religious note of Lincoln in the solemn sen- 
tence : "If piety be the rational exercise of the human 

47 



Charles soul, if religion be not a chimera, and if the vestiges of 
Francis heavenly assistance are clearly traced in those events 
Richardson which mark the annals of our nation, it becomes us on 
this day, in consideration of the great things which the 
Lord has done for us, to render the tribute of unfeigned 
thanks to God who superintends the universe and holds 
aloft the scale tjiat weighs the destinies of nations." 

Passing an interesting illustration of the triplicate 
form which Webster was so frequently to use — "For us 
they fought, for us they bled, for us they conquered" — 
and an allusion to "Dartmouth, towering majestic above 
the groves which encircle her," and now inscribing 
"her glory on the registers of fame," we find the key- 
note of the speech, the sign of the life-work of Webster 
the expounder of Constitutional Union, in these words : 
"No sooner was peace restored with England, the first 
grand article of which was the acknowledgment of our 
independence, than the old system of confederation, 
dictated at first by necessity, and adopted for the pur- 
poses of the moment, was found inadequate to the gov- 
ernment of an extensive empire. Under a full convic- 
tion of this, we then saw the people of these states en- 
gaged in a transaction which is undoubtedly the great- 
est approximation towards human perfection the politi- 
cal world ever yet experienced, and which, perhaps, 
will forever stand on the history of mankind without a 
parallel. A great republic, composed of different states, 
whose interest, in all respects, could not be perfectly 
compatible, then came deliberately forward, discarded 
one system of government, and adopted another, with- 
out the loss of one man's blood. There is not a single 
government now existing in Europe which is not based 

48 



in usurpation, and established, if established at all, by Charles 
ths sacrifice of thousands. But, in the adoption of our Francis 
present system of jurisprudence, we see the powers nee- Richardson 
essary for the f^overnment voluntarily sprino^ing from 
the people, their only proper origin, and directed to the 
public good, their only proper object." 

While an undergraduate, Webster was keenly inter- 
ested in national politics, being, like most of the faculty 
and constituency of the College, Federalist in sympathy. 
From " Beechnut Hall, Hanover, Dec. 28, 1800," he 
wrote : "Long are the faces of the Hanoverians. Jef- 
ferson's Presidency, which now seems certain, sits not 
very well on our stomachs. All the tonics of our politi- 
cal faculty cannot make it digest readily. Burr, too, 
nettles us more than any vegetable burr in our fields. 
However, what cannot be cured must be endured." In 
the same letter he added, on a more general theme : "I 
am fully persuaded that our happiness is much at our 
regulation, and that the 'know thyself of the Greek 
philosopher meant no more than rightly to attune and 
soften our appetites and passions till they should sym- 
phonize like the harp of David. Mr. Stewart has shown 
us some fine ideas on it. He is an author whom I ad- 
mire more than any writer I have perused." 

He who wrote thus had a heart as well as a mind. 
No episode in Webster's college course meant more to 
him than the arrival of his brother Ezekiel, accompanied 
by his father, in ]\Iarch, 1801, to join the Freshman 
class ; then and for several years to be aided intellect- 
ually and financially by his loyal predecessor in college 
life. The Kentucky novelist, James Lane Allen, in his 
recent picture of the poverty brought upon a hemp- 

49 



Charles farmer by his son's residence, for a year or two, in an 
Francis inexpensive college, could present to us nothing more 
Richardson effective than Webster's own account of the Salisbury 
household immediately after his graduation : "Return- 
ing home after Commencement, I found, on considera- 
tion, that it would be impossible for my father, under ex- 
isting circumstances, to keep Ezekiel at college. Drained 
of all his little income by the expenses of my educa- 
tion thus far, and broken down in his exertions by some 
family occurrences, I saw he could not afford Ezekiel 
means to live abroad with ease and independence, 
and I knew too well the evils of penury to wish him to 
stay half beggared at college. I thought it, therefore, 
my duty to suffer some delay in my profession, for the 
sake of serving my elder brother, and was making a 
little interest in some places to the eastward for employ- 
ment." Never has there been a time, from that day to 
this, as some of you know by your own tender memo- 
ries, when D irtmouth men have not made a little inter- 
est for employment, and suffered some delay in their 
profession, that they might give a brother the power to 
enjoy the advantages of the college of their love. 

A lie dies with proverbial procrastination ; like the 
snapping-turtle's heart, when thrown on the pavement, 
it persistently beats long after life has left the rest of the 
sluggish body. But surely, after a hundred years, it is 
time to give final interment to the venerable mendacity 
that Webster, on Commencement day, withdrew to the 
rear of Dartmouth Hall and tore up his diploma. It 
rests upon no authority ; it is contradicted by common, 
sense ; it is inconsistent with Webster's frequent visits 
to Hanover within a few years of his graduation, and 

50 



his affectionate correspondence concerning the town and Charles 
the College, to which he sent his brother and his son ; Francis 
and it is explicitly denied by his chief biographer and Richardson 
literary executor, as well as by Professor Shurtleff and 
other immediate contemporaries or eye-witnesses of his 
graduation, some of whom never heard of it until a 
quarter of a century later. His class-mate Smith stood 
at Webster's side when he "received his degree with a 
graceful bow"; and the same clergyman adds : " Such 
was my connection with him in our society affairs that 
if he had destroyed it afterward I should certainly have 
known it." Far truer would be the assertion that no 
graduate of an American college, by the acts and words 
of a lifetime — words culminating in the most famous of 
tributes to an institution of learning — ever eave more 
distinguished proof of his love for the seminary where 
he began his work for the world. Let there be praeterea 
nihil of Charles Lanman's poor fable of the torn diploma, 
thrown to the win Is on the alleged "green" east of 
DartmDUth Hill, while Webster shouted, as a valedic- 
tory oration : "My iuiustry may make me a great 
man, but this miserable parchment cannot"; or of 
Theodore Parker's gratuitous inaccuracy that he 
"scorned his degree, and when the faculty gave him his 
diploma, he tore it to pieces in the College yard, in the 
presence of some of his mates, it is said, and trod it 
under foot." It must have been a matter of reeret to 
these two historical thinkers that a third authority in a 
published wood-cut portrayed the scene as visible in a 
third locality, the rear of the College church. The truth 
concerning his own disappointment, or the keener regret 
of his class-mates, over his failure to receive a Commence- 

5t 



Charles ment part is probably to be found in the recollections of 
Francis Judo^e Samuel Swift, who said that Thomas A. Merrill, 
Richardson afterwards pastor in Middlebury, Vt. (the judge's own 
home), was deemed by the faculty the most correct 
recitation scholar in the class, and thus given the salu- 
tatory, the first appointment for Commencement, the 
class being allowed to elect the valedictorian, which they 
failed to do, because of a Social and Frater quarrel, 
desiring and expecting, however, that the faculty would 
appoint Webster, which was not done. In other words, 
there seems to have been a "class row," after which 
some of Webster's class-mates blamed the faculty for not 
doing what they had failed to do themselves. "As long 
as Webster lived," said Professor Sanborn, "he believed 
society feuds deprived him of his honors," an influen- 
tial professor having belonged to the Social Friends ; 
but the same authority adds : "I cannot say that Mr. 
Webster's suspicions were well grounded." The idea 
of professorial confusion between society prejudices and 
undergraduate appointments is more prevalent than 
sound. It seems that the faculty offered Webster the 
choice between an English poem or an English oration, 
neither of which he felt at liberty to take, for reasons 
now obscure, so that he and some others were "excused 
from speaking," on their own motion. Webster was 
too large a man to allow a real or fancied grievance to 
cloud Commencement day or his tender memories of the 
"small college" he did so much to make famous ; and 
meanwhile he satisfied the Fraternity division of his 
class by giving an oration the day before Commence- 
ment. Caleb Tenney, afterwards a minister in Rhode 
Island and Connecticut, was the man who got the 

52 



valedictory appointment. Judge Swift thought Tenney Charles 
a good scholar and an excellent young man. The same Francis 
judicial authority, I may add, bore testimony to the Richardson 
fact that Webster, while not technically "leading the 
class," had the best all-round mind and the broadest 
influence, a condition which has very often been repeat- 
ed in subsequent classes, in the opinion of those of us 
who, though possibly not Websters, were certainly not 
valedictorians. Dr. IMerrill, the Latin salutatorian and 
highest scholar, himself, modestly wrote in 1853 that 
"the Faculty thought it would be almost barbarous to 
set the best English scholar in the class [Webster] to 
jabber in Latin." While quoting Dr. Merrill, let me 
suggest to those of you who may similarly be called 
upon for reminiscences of famous class-mates, to copy 
the discreet form elsewhere adopted by him when asked 
for recollections of Webster : "I presume, confidently, 
that he was never concerned in any mischief. I suppose 
that he acted upon the principle of mastering his lessons 
and attending on all the exercises of the college, both 
literary and religious." 

But we must not dwell longer upon the earlier days 
of one whose later years were to be so rich and full. 

It is the power of the poet to gather into a few lum- 
inous words some fadeless picture of memory or imagi- 
nation. Seldom has a lifetime been more successfully 
portrayed in four lines than in one stanza of Oliver 
Wendell Holmes' poem on the birthday of Daniel Web- 
ster, written four years after the statesman's death. The 
signer, as well as the subject, had trodden Dartmouth 
ground and sat within these walls ; and so it was natur- 
al that one line of this comprehensive stanza should be 

53 



Charles devoted to Webster's college life. Let me close by re- 
Francis calling his fitly chosen words, for they must often recur 
Richardson to our minds during the remaining hours of these 
memorial days : 

"A roof beneath the mountain pines ; 
The cloisters of a hill-girt plain ; 
The front of life's embattled lines ; 

A mound beside the heaving main." 



THe Development of tKe College 
Since tHe Dartmouth College 
Case. 

(Address by Professor John King Lord, Ph.T>., '68. 

HE history of the College, like that of the coun- 
try, presents several well marked periods. There 
is the period of discovery and settlement, the pe- 



T 



"i^^j 



riod of storm and struggle, and the period of later de- 
velopment. The first two periods, including Eleazar 
Wheelock's coming to New Hampshire and the found- 
ing of the College, and the contest between the College 
and the State settled by the decision of the Supreme 
Court at Washington, are romantic, exciting and well 
known. The last period, covering more time nearly 
twice over than the other two, presents few points of in- 
terest except such as are naturally connected with the 
growth of an institution. It is my purp ^se to-day to 
give a brief outline of the change of the " small college" 
of Daniel Webster's day into the larger institution 
whose one hundred and thirty-two years are crowned 

54 



witli honor and inflnence, and lighted with the promise John 
of still greater good. King 

The condition of the College after the decision at Lord 
Washington was lamentable in the extreme. It was in- 
deed victorions ; it had established its rights, bnt it had 
little else in which to rejoice. Its two bnildings were 
in poor condition, while its property was scanty and in 
disorder. Most of this was in lands, and tenants, while 
the rival claims of the College and the State were un- 
settled , had hesitated in paying rents and after the case 
was adjudicated were slow to respond to the demands of 
the College trustees for what was due. There had 
been some loss in tuition, and in 1819 the trustees es- 
timated their loss in tuition, room-rents, fees, etc., at 
$8,771.50. In addition to the disorganization of its in- 
come the College was in debt to its own officers for over- 
due salaries, to outsiders for money borrowed, and to 
the estate of John Wheelock, so that in 1820 a com- 
mittee of the trustees reported the resources of the Col- 
lege, at a favorable reckoning, as falling below its lia- 
bilities by $2,924.95. The victory of the College had 
not turned opponents into friends, and a large portion of 
the state was unwilling to render any assistance even if 
it did not actually support plans of a hostile nature. 
But the crowning disaster was the death of its able and 
beloved president, Francis Brown, who worn out by his 
labors died on the 27th of July, 1820. 

On the other hand the trustees still held to their 
purpose, and were determined that victory should not 
be mocked by despair. To their support came a large 
party, especially the clergymen of the state, while the 
student body held to its allegiance and maintained its 

55 



John numbers. Using their victory- with moderation the 
King trustees received the students of the University on the 
Lord same terms as students from any New England college, 
and endeavored in other ways to conciliate their oppo- 
nents. 

What they had most to fear was the establishment 
of a rival college in the state, and plans to this end 
were several times broached. The Medical College, in 
which the State had an interest, was a nucleus about 
which many schemes gathered, one in particular being 
a proposition by a Dr. Alexander Ramsay, a Scotch- 
man, to open with the aid of the State a Medical vSchool 
at Concord. But the good sense of the State prevailed 
and one after another all these schemes fell through. 
Yet they caused anxiety, and at one time the trustees, 
in recognition of the interest of the State, proposed as a 
counter move that a board of overseers, similar to the 
one in the University, with a veto power on the board 
of trustees, be appointed by the governor and be self- 
perpetuating. The suggestion seems to have come in 
all good faith from President Allen of the University 
and to have found much favor with the trustees, but it 
was abandoned under the emphatic advice of Mr. Web- 
ster, who saw in it only ill. In 1825 ^ ^^^^^ was intro- 
duced into the New Hampshire House to establish such 
a board, accompanied by a grant (one half of the liter- 
ary fund and one half the receipts from it for ten years), 
but it was postponed till the next session and never re- 
appeared. In 1827 a bill to establish a state institution 
in Merrimac county to be called the '' New Hampshire 
University " passed the Senate, but was rejected in the 
House at the first reading by a vote of 121 to 58, so 

56 



great a change had come over that body. With that John 
vote ended the apprehension of hostile legislation. King 

The succession to the presidency caused much ^^^ 
anxiety. The Rev. Daniel Dana, D. D., of Newbury- 
port, Mass., a graduate of 1788, who was chosen to suc- 
ceed Pres. Brown, entered on office Oct. 25, 1820, but 
almost immediately his health failed and he resigned 
within the year. After some delay the Rev. Bennett 
Tyler of South Britain, Conn., was chosen in his place 
and was inaugurated March 27, 1822. He was a preacher 
of unusual excellence, of winning personality, and of 
earnestness, well adapted to gain friends for the College. 
The years of his administration were years of recovery^, 
of re-organization and of preparation. In fact the de- 
cision of the controversy was hardly made when steps 
were taken to advance. During the four years from 
1 815 all the instruction in the College had been given 
by the President, Professors Adams and Shurtliff, and 
two tutors. In 18 19 the faculty was enlarged by the 
appointment of the Rev. Charles B. Haddock as profes- 
sor of rhetoric and oratory. In 1820 Wm. Chamber- 
lain was elected professor of Greek and Latin, and the 
medical faculty was strengthened by a professor of 
chemistry. In 1823 there was established the chair of 
natural philosophy, and for the first time in the cata- 
logue the distinction was made between the ''Academi- 
cal" and the "Medical" departments, indicative of the 
enlarging ideas. In 1826 the Sophomore tutor was dis- 
continued and the class put in charge of a professor. 
The appointment of Professor Haddock was followed by 
the establishment of rhetorical and oratorical prizes, the 
money for the prizes being given partly by individuals 

57 



John and partly by the trustees, and of rhetorical exhibitions 
King of the three upper classes, called from the time of their 
Lord occurrence, in November, March and Alay, "Quarter 
Davs." The two literarv societies of the College, the 
Social Friends and the United Fraternity, were brought 
into renewed activity and a strong stimulus given to 
literary and rhetorical study. 

The movement of College life and indeed the prog- 
ress of the College may best be seen from matters that 
are in themselves of no great moment. In 1820 the 
catalogue, then published by the Sophomore class, was 
changed from a broadside into a pamphlet, though still 
but a list of names, and first in 1822 contained the terms 
of admission which were as follows : It was required 
"that the candidate be well versed in the Grammar of 
the English, Latin and Greek languages, in Virgil, 
Cicero's Select Orations, Sallust, the Greek Testament, 
DalzePs Collectanea Grasca IMinora, Latin and Greek 
Prosody, Arithmetick, and Ancient and ]\Iodern Geogra- 
phy ; and that he be able accuratel}' to translate English 
into Latin." In 1823 the catalogue contained the 
names of the state officers, ex officio members of the 
board in relation to funds given by the state, and was 
printed by Isaac Hill, the publisher of the N. H. Patriot, 
and the leader of the former University party, indica- 
tions of the change in feeling-. In that same vear and 
the next President Tyler solicited a fund of $10,000, 
now known as the "Charity Fund," the income of 
which was to be used in paying the tuition of students 
intending to be ministers. Toward this fund Mr. Hill 
gave $50. In 1822 stoves were put into Dartmouth 
Hall and the fireplaces, which hitherto had been the 

58 



only means of heating-, were bricked up. Think, ye John 
that in 1901 complain of steam-heated radiators, what King 
Dartmouth Hall was in 1822 ! In 1824 the recitation l^rd 
rooms, which had been the rooms of the students them- 
selves, and had been furnished and cared for by them, 
were provided and furnished by the College. In the 
same year the policy of the College in the treatment of 
negroes was settled. Edward ]\Iitchell, a negro born in 
Martinique, W. I., who had accompanied President 
Brown on his return from the South in 1820, having 
since that time been an inmate of his house, applied for 
admission to College. The trustees at first declined to 
admit him, fearing that his presence would not be ac- 
ceptable to the students, but they on hearing of the mat- 
ter held a meeting and requested that he might be 
admitted. He was admitted and was graduated in 
1828. 

A College uniform was adopted in 1825, approved 
by the faculty and trustees, but not made compulsory. 
"It consisted of a black single-breasted coat with roll- 
ing collar, having on the left breast a sprigged diamond 
three and a half inches long and three inches wide : and 
on the left sleeve half a sprigged diamond for Freshmen, 
two halves placed one above the other for Sophomores, 
three for Juniors, and four for Seniors : with black or 
white pantaloons, stockings, vests and cravats. * * it 
was quite generally adopted, but survived no longer 
than the first suit lasted." 

The life of the students was very frugal. "Most 
of them," says a student of the time, "defrayed their 
expenses by teaching school. * * There was among 
them great plainness of dress and furniture, and great 

59 



John freedom from all forms of expensive amusement and dis- 
King sipation." Their surroundings and discipline were 
Lord Spartan. As is well known, morning prayers were held 
as soon as it was light enough to read and a recitation 
was held before breakfast. Evening prayers were held 
at five o'clock, or as late as the light permitted, and on 
Tuesdays a "dissertation by one of the Seniors followed 
the religious exercises." Morning chapel continued to 
be held before breakfast till 1856, and evening prayers 
were given up only in 1863. The chapel had no means 
of heating and ferv^ency of devotion was the onh- pro- 
tection against the winter's cold. On Sundays the stu- 
dents attended morning and evening prayers and also 
forenoon and afternoon services in the church, while a 
biblical exercise was attended in the evening or Monday 
morning. "During the Sabbath," so ran the laws of 
the College, "each student shall remain in his chamber 
unless the duties of public worship or acts of necessity' 
or mercy call him elsewhere — and whoever shall on that 
day attend to any secular business or to diversion, or 
shall make any improper noise, or shall unnecessarily 
walk in the fields or streets or elsewhere shall be subject 
to the penalties mentioned in the foregoing section." 
Cards, dice and all unlawful games were prohibited, as 
well as the keeping or firing of gunpowder in or near 
the College premises. Fines were a common form of 
discipline, and five to twenty-five cents were imposed 
for failure to perform an exercise, but " one recitation 
and two prayers per week [were] free from fines." 

The faculty "was particularly and earnestly recom- 
mended" by the trustees "to exercise as far as possible a 
parental authority, to inform themselves concerning each 

60 



one's moral and literary character * * and in frequent John 
and familiar intercourse to administer caution, counsel King 
and encouragement, * * to reprove any known viola- Lord 
tion of decorum and to check every perceived tendency 
to negli«-ence or dissipation." That this might be 
secured there were to be" weekly visitations of students 
in their rooms, by members of the faculty assigned for 
that purpose. 

President Tyler resigned in 1828, being drawn to 
the work of the pulpit for which he was eminently fit- 
ted. In his stead was chosen the Rev. Nathan Lord, 
D. D., a graduate of Bowdoin in 1809, then a minister 
in Amherst, N. H., and already a trustee of the College. 
After much hesitation he accepted and was inaugurated 
October 29, 1828. Two years before a committee of 
the trustees, of which he was the leading member, had 
been appointed "to take into consideration the whole 
internal affairs of the College." Their report together 
with one made by a similar committee, of which Air. 
Lord was chairman, two years later, became the basis 
of far-reaching changes. Fines were abolished, the 
marking system was introduced, the courses of study 
re-arranged, examination for entrance by at least three 
members of the faculty, a name first used in 1828, was 
required, provision made for an examining committee 
from abroad, and an annual report by the president on 
the state of the College was provided for. It is interest- 
ing to note that the report contains a discussion of the 
place of Greek in college and leans decidedly to the 
view that it should be elective. Within two years sever- 
al changes took place in the faculty. A new depart- 
ment of moral philosophy and political economy was 

61 



John established and also one of chemistry and niineralog}', 

King and in 1829 "Algebra to simple Equations, an abridged 

Lord system of Rhetorick and some History of the United 

States" were added to the requirements for admission, 

but the last two were withdrawn in 1837. 

The number of students which from 1815 to 1820 
had been about one hundred had increased under Presi- 
dent Tyler to about one hundred and seventy besides 
the medical students who numbered about one hundred, 
but for a few years had declined, the impression having 
gained ground that the Iniildings of the College were 
decayed and that accommodations were not as good as 
elsewhere. In 1827 the trustees recognizing the situa- 
tion voted thoroughly to repair the buildings, two in 
number, Dartmouth Hall and the chapel, which stood 
nearly on the present site of Thornton Hall, to clear the 
grounds and to surround them by a fence, and that a 
subscription of fifty thousand dollars be started with 
special reference to new buildings. The work lagging 
it was voted the next year to repair ''The College," and 
to remove the chapel and to erect two new buildings of 
brick at an estimated cost of $12,000. The foundations 
of the two buildings, Thornton and Wentworth Halls, 
were laid by Aug. 1828 and the buildings were complet- 
ed in October 1829. The cost exceeded $16,000. A 
"suitable fence" was built in front of the College yard, 
the dial face in the western gable of Dartmouth Hall 
was first made alive with a clock, and the bell was hung 
which called the students to their work for nearly forty 
years till it cracked in 1867. The subscription, which 
was conditioned on raising $30,000, was vigorously 
begun by President Tyler and later completed by Presi- 

62 



dent Lord, tlioiigli made binding in the end only by a John 
subscription of $700 by himself. King 

The decade beginning with 1830 was marked by Lord 
great changes and great growth. The spring of that 
year was also made remarkable by a College rebellion. 
The uncertainties incident to a change of administration, 
the issuing of a new and more stringent code of laws by 
the trustees, the change in the course of study with the 
rigorous requirement of an afternoon recitation, hither- 
to largely a matter of form, and the occupancy of the 
new dormitory bringing the students into closer associa- 
tion, resulted in "various irregularities and disturbances 
which the ordinary influences of authority could not 
prevent." Several students were severely disciplined 
and the College rose in rebellion, but President Lord in 
addressing it uttered the famous sentence, effective then, 
and throughout his administration, "Go, young gentle- 
men, if you wish, we can bear to see our seats vacated, 
but not our laws violated," and authority was restored. 

The changes in the faculty were many. In 183 1 
Calvin E. Stowe took the chair of Greek and Latin, but 
was succeeded two years later by the accomplished 
scholar Alpheus Crosby. With him was associated in 
1835 Edwin D. Sanborn, whom so many of the graduates 
of the middle life most cordially remember, and who in 

1837 on the division of the chair became professor of 
Latin. Oliver P. Hubbard, wdio died but a little over a 
year ago, entered the faculty in 1836 as associate pro- 
fessor of physical sciences, but the next year he became 
professor of chemistry, mineralogy' and geolog>'. In 

1838 Rev. David Peabody took the chair of rhetoric and 
oratory in place of Professor Haddock who in turn had 

63 



John succeeded Dr. Oliver in the chair of intellectual philos- 
King ophy, to which was joined English literature. Natural 
Lord philosophy and mathematics were also separated, Ira 
Young retaining the former, and Stephen Chase being 
made professor of mathematics. In this year Professor 
Shurtliff became Professor Emeritus, as Professor Adams 
had done five years before, thus removing from active 
ser\'ice the last member of the faculty who had shared 
in the great controversy. The appointment of a pro- 
fessor of modern languages was earnestly discussed by 
the board and it was voted to appoint one, but the funds 
were lacking, and for a series of years instruction was 
given by individuals paid by the students, though the 
College contributed about one quarter of the stipend. 
French appears as an elective in the course of study in 
185 1, but it was not until 1859 that a professor of mod- 
em languages was appointed when William A. Packard, 
now a member of the faculty of Princeton University, 
was chosen to that place. Two professorships were 
partially endowed in 1838, the Hall professorship of 
mineralogy and geology and the Evans professorship 
of oratory and belles lettres. 

At the beginning of the decade the medical faculty 
consisted of two professors besides Professor Hale who 
grave instruction in chemistrv. At its close, besides Pro- 
fessor Hubbard in place of Professor Hale and one lec- 
turer, there were four professors, among whom were 
Dixi Crosby, eminent among a family of physicians, 
and the afterward famous Oliver Wendell Holmes. 

The exterior of the College so greatly improved by 
the erection of the new buildings and the fencing of the 
yard was still further advanced by the levelling and the 

64 



enclosure of the common in 1835. Indicative of the John 
general progress, was the change of Commencement in King 
1834 from the last Wednesday of August to the last Lord 
Wednesday in July, for which, however, Thursday was 
substituted the next year, and this continued to be the 
date of Commencement till 1863 when it was placed one 
week earlier. This was changed in 1877 to the last 
Thursday of June for which again Wednesday, the pres- 
ent date, was substituted in 1894. In 1832 for the first 
time the Senior class was invited to attend the public 
dinner at Commencement and "eight cents were added 
to the quarter bills of every student" to meet the ex- 
pense. In 1837 the salaries of the professors were raised 
from ^700 to $900, at which sum they continued till 
1854 when $200 more were added to them. 

An increased literary spirit was evidenced by at- 
tempts of the students, though unsuccessful, in 1835 
and 1837 to establish a literar\' magazine. In 1839 an- 
other attempt was successful and The Dartmouth con- 
tinued till 1844-45 when it died, but it re-appeared 
twenty years later in 1867, and having changed from a 
literary magazine to a college paper it still continues a 
vigorous existence. Its former place was taken by the 
Dartmouth Literary Monthly in 1887. The same im- 
pulse led to the establishment in 1841 of the Greek 
letter societies, the Psi Upsilon fraternity having the 
first chapter and others following. That they did not 
meet with the entire favor of the authorities is shown 
by a vote of the trustees in 1846 that "after 1849 no 
further elections be made for members of any other so- 
cieties [than Phi Beta Kappa, Social Friends, United 
Fraternity and Theological] except by permission of 

65 



John the faculty." The permission however seems to have 
King been freeh' given for there was no interruption in the 
Lord life of the societies. 

In 1837 Moor Hall, or the "Academy" as it was 
called, was erected for the use of Moor's School, but it 
passed in the fifties to the use of the Chandler School, 
was remodelled in 1871 and again in 1898 into the 
present Chandler Building. In the next year (or in 
1839) a new building was begun on the site of the old 
President Wheelock house, which was moved to its present 
site where it is now known as the Howe Library. The 
new building was finished in 1840 and named Reed 
Hall in honor of William Reed, a trustee, who left a 
bequest to the College, but its cost, about $15,000, was 
a severe tax upon the resources of the College as the 
legacy of Mr. Reed did not become available for nearly 
twenty years. 

One of the marked changes introduced by President 
Lord was the abolition of honors. The marking system 
was but just introduced, as I have said, and before its 
introduction the only distinctions of scholarship had 
been the appointments to the exhibitions on the "Quarter 
Days." These had given rise to endless friction and 
the Sophomore exhibition had been abolished in 1823. 
The Junior exhibition disappeared in 1S32, leaving "the 
honors of the College to be gathered only once — at the 
time of graduation." But the same trouble appeared 
as at the Quarter Days, and in 1834 on the recommenda- 
tion of the president, supported by a petition from the 
larger part of the students, college honors were abolished 
and Commencement parts were assigned to the whole 
class, but prize speaking was continued till 1838. As 

66 



the class of 1835 numbered fifty it can be imagined that John 
Commencement day was almost beyond endurance, and King 
though the trustees voted that if necessary the exercises Lord 
might be extended over two days, yet it was found 
better to restrict the number of speakers, which was 
done at first by excusing, but after 1839 by lot. This 
method continued through President Lord's administra- 
tion, though not without strong opposition. After the 
first the faculty desired the restoration of honors and in 
1840 all its members but one joined in a request to that 
end, but the trustees held with the President, as they did 
again in 1858 when the alumni in Boston presented a 
memorial asking for the restoration of honors and the 
establishment of prizes. Their answer set forth by 
President Lord based their refusal on the grounds that 
such things were unchristian and immoral as making an 
appeal to wrong motives and hurtful ambition. 

It is difficult for those who have seen only the 
Commencements of late years to appreciate the celebra- 
tions of the past. In former years Commencement was 
not merely an academic celebration, it was a grand festi- 
val of the nature and display of a country fair. Instead 
of the comparatively few alumni and friends of the 
graduating class who now attend, the village was filled 
with hundreds and even thousands of people who came 
in vehicles of every description from all the country 
about. A man living near once told me that he had 
not missed a Commencement for fifty years. The south- 
ern end of the common was covered with booths of cooks, 
candymakers, peddlars, nostrum venders, jugglers, 
gamblers and sellers of hard cider and other harder 
drinks. Noise, confusion and drunkenness abounded. 

67 



John 111 the church were the exercises of a literary institution, 
King on the common the turbulence of a good-natured but 
^^<^ howling mob. In 1833 a newspaper correspondent 
wrote, "I was sorry to see such a host of peddlars, 
gamblers, drunkards and shows. I was never more 
astonished than to see at such an anniversary and at 
such a place the unaccountable degree of immorality and 
vice. I should think that there were in sight of one 
another thirty places of gambling. During the per- 
formances in the meeting house the vociferations of a 
dozen auctioneers were to be di.stinctly heard in the 
house." Nor was the attendance onlv of siohtseers. 
Men of note and men of letters graced the occasion be- 
sides those who came to give addresses. Among the 
latter were the most famous of the country and their 
audiences honored them in character as in numbers. In 
1843 a visitor wrote, "The crowd was immense. Thurs- 
day there were 1,200 who could not get into the church, 
I had the honor to hear and shake hands with the im- 
mortal Daniel Webster, Levi Woodbury and daughters, 
Mr. Bronson [the orator of the occasion] , Mr. Peabody, 
Mr. Aiken of Boston, Gen. Root of New York and a 
whole lot of worthies. I wish you could see Webster : 
he is a siLfht worth seeing. Such a high, expansive, 
intellectual forehead I never looked upon before and 
'ne'er shall look upon his like again.' Bronson said he 
never addressed so intellectual an audience before in his 
life. The concert was on Wednesday evening bv the 
negro band from Philadelphia. The music was soul- 



stirring. ' 



This same visitor gave an account of the Com- 
mencement of 1845. "The village has been filled, filled 

68 



to overflowing. Herr Dillsbach (manager of a travel- John 
ling menagerie) and Ole Bnll were among the promi- King 
nent lions of the day. * * [The speaking and confer- Lord 
ring of degrees] closed the exercises of Commencement, 
opening at a little before ten and continning without 
intermission until 4 p.m. * * The menagerie was opened 
in the forenoon and afternoon both. * * * There was 
such a terrible crowd I did not go, although I should 
like to liave seen some of Dillsbacli's wonderful feats. * * 
Ole Bull's concert came on about 5 o'clock. Tickets 
$1.00 apiece. At nine o'clock in the evening we went 
up to the assembly rooms in the new College [Reed 
Hall] where the graduating class held their select Levee. 
It was very tastefully decorated and tbe tables most mag- 
nificently spread. We had peaches, apricots, grapes, 
oranges, raisins, figs, nuts of all kinds, pickled fish, 
water melons a foot and a half or two feet long, cakes, 
ice cream, tea, coffee and lemonade. The students gave 
this instead of a ball. Kendall's band played and all 
went off well."* 

The College made a remarkable gain in numbers 
between 1830 and 1840. The average number of stu- 

*The following from the diary of a resident of Hanover relates to 

the same Commencement: 

"July 31st. The annual Commencement this day and a fine fair 
day too. The smallest literary procession that I have noticed for sev- 
eral years — but an uncommon rush of all kinds of people from the cir- 
cumstance that there was uncommon attractions for them. A some- 
what extensive Menagiere of wild animals (in most miserable plight 
however). The Boston Brass band of musicians, and the famous for- 
eign Violin player named Ole Bull, and 4 Albinoes or white negroes. 
Every thing to pick away money and lead the mind of people from 
the great concerns of eternity and their duties of charity to their needy 
fellow citizens and the perishing heathen. Even clergymen were so 
enraptured that tliey could not resist the invitation to hand out their 
half dollar to hear him scrape his catgut — and another quarter to hear 
the brass band perform." 

69 



John dents for the fifteen years to 1835 was about 150. In 
King; that year it reached 200 and in 1840 it was 340, and in 
Lord 1842 there were graduated 85, the largest class in the 
history of the College till recent years. But a rapid 
decline ensued and instead of a class of a hundred as in 
1838 there entered in 1842 a class of but 43, which 
graduated 30. Comparatively little change occurred 
till about 1850 when the average attendance rose to 
about two hundred and fifty in addition to the Chandler 
and medical students, a permanent gain to the College of 
about sixty-six per cent. It is difficult to state definitely 
the causes that led to these changes. The first in- 
crease aside from local influences seems to have corres- 
ponded with a general movement toward college life 
throughout New England and the decline to the effect 
of other institutions and the openiug up of railroads that 
facilitated communication. 

The decrease in the number of students with the 
consequent loss of revenue led the trustees in 1842 to at- 
tempt the raising by subscription of a fund of $50,000. 
The sub.scription which was not to be binding un- 
less $30,000 were subscribed by August i, 1S43 fell 
$7,000 short of that condition. Among the subscribers 
was Samuel Appleton of Boston, who had sent a check 
for $1,000. On being notified that it would be returned 
he declined to receive it and urged the renewal of the 
subscription. It was again attempted with two years' 
limitation, but as the limit of time drew near the fund 
still lacked $4,000 of completion. Again Mr. Appleton 
came forward and with a check for $9,000 both clinched 
the subscription and raised the amount of the fund to 
$35,000. This fund was made the foundation of the 

70 



professorship of natural philosophy which in His honor John 
was called the Appleton professorship, and was the first King 
fully endowed chair in the College. The relief given l-otd 
by it to the College finances was very great and enabled 
the trustees to make sorely needed repairs in the build- 



ings. 



The next important gift to the College was the 
bequest of Abiel Chandler who in 185 1 left $50,000 for 
"the establishment and support of a permanent depart- 
ment or school of instruction in said College in the prac- 
tical and useful arts of life." This was a new departure 
in scientific education and partly for that reason, partly 
because the oversight of the fund was entrusted to two 
visitors, the trustees had some hesitation in accepting 
the gift, but after careful consideration of the legal and 
educational questions involved the trust was accepted. 
In the fall of 1852 the new work was opened under the 
title of the "Chandler Scientific School." The course 
of study covered three years, and was divided into 
two "Departments," the Senior of two years, and the 
Junior "preparatory to the Senior" of one year. The 
tuition was $30 and $20 respectively, the College tuition 
being $36*, and the terms of the Senior department 
corresponded to those of the College, while the Junior 
had four instead of three. This arrangement con- 
tinued till 1857 when the course was unified and extend- 
ed to four years. The fund not being sufficient to sup- 
port an independent faculty the instruction was given 
mainly by members of the College faculty at a stipulated 
rate. This arrangement though productive of some 

♦Tuition was $27 in 1848; 531.50 in 1849 ; $36 in 1851 ; S42 in 1855; 
S51 in i860. 

7J 



John friction and modified later by the appointment of some 
King who confined their instruction to the Chandler School 
Lor^ and formed a distinct faculty, continued till the merg- 
ing of the school and the College in 1893. The general 
management of the school, under the president, was 
given to one man, who for a time was called "Rector." 
It was fortunate in its chief officers, the first one being 
Professor James W. Patterson. He was followed by 
Professor John S. Woodman from 1857 to 1870 and he 
in turn by Professor Edward R. Ruggles, whose long 
and efficient service in the school was continued in the 
College after 1893 as the head of the department of 
German. The school began with twenty-eight students 
and for many years made a slow but steady growth. In 
1865 in accordance with the expansive views of Presi- 
dent Smith's administration it was called the "Chandler 
Scientific Department." Prudence in the care of its 
funds and the gifts of friends increased its foundation 
nearly fourfold. 

The equipment of the College for instruction in 
science was still further increased by the erection of the 
observatory in 1854. This with its instruments was 
largely the gift of Dr. George C. Shattuck of the class 
of 1803. The telescope was purchased in ^lunich by 
Professor Ira Young, who went abroad for that purpose, 
but was replaced by a larger and finer instrument in 
187 1 when the obser^'^atory was re-furnished under the 
direction of his son, Professor Charles A. Young. 

President Lord resigned his ofiice July 24, 1863 
after a service of thirty-five years. F'or some years he 
had been the foremost exponent of the pro-slavery views 
then prevalent in the South. Though he never obtrud- 

72 



ed these on the students among whom they passed as John 
"peculiarities," and though under him Dartmouth King 
offered an unequalled hospitality to the negro, yet even Lord 
before the outbreak of the Civil War they had rendered 
him obnoxious to many, and in June 1863 led an asso- 
ciation of ministers to question the desirability of his 
continuance in the presidency. The trustees in reply 
to their communication expressed their confidence in the 
President but dissented strongly from his views. The 
President immediately resigned on the ground that the 
action of the trustees imposed a "test" of opinion and 
that it was "inconsistent with Christian charity and pro- 
priety to carry on [his] administration while holding 
and expressing opinions injurious, as they imagine, to 
the interests of the College." 

The long presidency of Dr. lyord was marked by the 
growth of which I have spoken, as well as by the in- 
crease of the faculty which was doubled between 1828 
and 1863, but its prevailing effect was the ideal of man- 
hood which he impressed upon the College. He was a 
man of strong nature and effective personality so that 
few of the 2,675 students who received their degrees at 
his hands failed to be permanently impressed by him. 
To his direct and long-continued influence was due in 
no small degree the development among the graduates 
of Dartmouth of that independence and force of charac- 
ter and action, that self-reliance and loyalty to one an- 
other that we call the "Dartmouth Spirit." 

The Rev. Asa D. Smith, D. D., of New York City, 
who was chosen to succeed Dr. Lord, was inaugurated 
November 18, 1863. His administration of thirteen 
years was marked by many changes and much enlarge- 

73 



John ment. There was a return at once to the system of 
King prizes and Commencement appointments by rank, and 
Lord the Junior exhibition was revived for a few years. 
There was a substantial addition to the endowment of 
the College. The church of which Dr. Smith had been 
pastor contributed$30,ooo as a presidential fund; $40,000 
were received from other sources, and Dr. Smith by 
personal solicitation raised $80,000 for the scholarship 
funds of the College. Many other valuable gifts were 
made including the gift in 1869 of Judge Richard Fletch- 
er of $90,000, and the partial foundation of the Law- 
rence professorship in 1872 of $15,000. In 1875 the 
College received the largest individual gift which up to 
that time had been made to an American college, the 
bequest of Tappan Wentworth of Lowell, ^Slass. Mr. 
Wentworth's estate fell but a little short of $500,000, 
but as its use was conditioned on its reaching that sum, 
and as it suffered a terrible shrinkage in value in the 
hard times immediately following Mr. Wentworth's 
death, it did not actually become available to the Col- 
lege till 1895. 

Of the many changes that occurred at that time 
some of them, minor yet significant, are to be men- 
tioned : the introduction of steam heat into Reed Hall 
in 1874, the introduction of gas into the chapel and 
recitation rooms in 1872 and into the buildings general- 
ly in 1874, the establishment of a reading room, sup- 
ported by voluntary contributions, in 1866, the partial 
opening of the College library in 1864 and the merging 
in 1874 of the libraries of the two literary societies with 
that of the College under the management of the trus- 
tees, the beginning of an athletic organization, in base- 

74 



ball, in 1865, the bringing back of Commencement to John 
the last Thursday in June in 1872, the substitution of King 
written for oral examinations except at the close of the Lord 
year in 1873, ^^^^^ the adoption in 1875 of the certificate 
system of admission to College. 

The centennial of the College in 1869 was cele- 
brated with great preparation and success. There was 
a great gathering of alumni and friends of the College. 
In addition to the ordinary programme of Commence- 
ment week there were special exercises and meetings of 
the alumni presided over by Salmon P. Chase, Chief 
Justice of the United States Supreme Court. The liter- 
ary exercises were addresses, historical and appropriate 
to the occasion, and special addresses by prominent 
alumni on the relation of the College to the various 
pursuits. They were held in a mammoth tent erected 
on the common, which was commodious but unhappily 
not water proof, and a heavy thunder shower that came 
up during the post-prandial exercises of Commencement 
day caused great dismay, and ruined the eloquence of 
the speakers and the toilets of the audience. As the 
rain poured through the canvas judges, litterati, doctors 
of divinity and professors sought refuge beneath the 
stage, but the water poured in concentrated force through 
the cracks between the boards and their last state was 
worse than their first. 

It was largely owing to the exertions of President 
Smith that the Agricultural College, established on the 
basis of the congressional land grant, was brought to 
Hanover and associated with Dartmouth in 1868, but 
the history of that institution which was removed to 
Durham in 1892 does not concern us to-day, further 

75 



John than that its coming to Hanover was believed by Presi- 
K-ing dent Smith to be of great importance to Dartmouth. 
*^^^ Of nuich more lasting significance was the opening of 
the Thayer School of Civil Engineering in 1873. It 
was based upon a gift of $70,000 by General Silvanus 
Thayer of the class of 1807, and though not formally 
was practically a post-graduate school. From the 
beginning it has been under the direction of Professor 
Robert Fletcher and though its numbers have been few 
it has taken rank among the best of its kind and adds 
a lustre to the College. 

The general faculty increased from seventeen mem- 
bers to twenty-nine including the members of the 
Agricultural College and the Thayer School. The 
number of students rose from 307 in 1863 to 409 in 
1876, the medical students gaining seventeen, the 
academic forty-five and scientific forty, to which the 
Agricultural College added twenty-four and the Thayer 
School six. 

Several buildings mark the progress of the period. 
In 1866 Bissell Hall was built, the finest college gym- 
nasium in New England when erected; in 1870 Culver 
Hall was built jointly by the College and the Agricul- 
tural College, as was also Conant Hall, now Hallgarten, 
in 1874, while in 1871, as I have said, Moor Hall was 
enlarged and became the Chandler Building, and in 
1 8 71 the Medical College Building was remodelled and 
improved. 

As the result of failing health President Smith 
resigned December 21, 1876, his resignation taking 
effect February i, 1877. He was succeeded by the Rev. 
Samuel C. Bartlett, D.D., who entering on his duties in 

76 



May was inaugurated at Commencement (June 27) of John 
that year. King 

But I have reached a time whose events are probably Loro 
known to you all. It will be enough partially to recall 
them. Under the administration of President Bartlettthe 
course of study was considerably modified by the intro- 
duction of electives, the Chandler Scientific Department 
was chanofed to the Chandler School of Science and the 
Arts and the work and relation of that school to the 
College were the occasion for much discussion and con- 
troversy. The Latin Scientific course, omitting Greek 
as a requirement and leading to the degree of B. L., 
was established in 1880. The endowments of five 
professorships were added to the funds and one that had 
been given earlier became available. The outward 
sign of advance remains in the buildings erected during 
his administration, Wilson Hall and Rollins Chapel 
in 1885, Wheelock Hotel in 1888, the Tower built by 
the classes from 1885 to 1895 inclusive, Bartlett Hall, 
the building of the Young Men's Christian Association 
erected in 1891 and named from President Bartlett, and 
the Thayer School Building purchased in 1892. 

The movement for the representation of the alumni 
on the board of trust was accomplished in 189 1. This 
movement, begun as far back as the early sixties, met 
the obstacle of an inflexible charter, that gave complete 
support to the conservative feeling that feared a change. 
The discussion between the alumni and the trustees, each 
having but infrequent meetings, dragged its slow length 
along till in 1876 the trustees proposed to allow the 
alumni to nominate four names for each of the next 
three vacancies on the board, one of which was to be 

77 



John outside of New Hampshire, and from each four they 
King would elect one. This proposition was accepted and in 
Lord 1878 three men were chosen to represent the alumni 
(Messrs. Prescott, Hitchcock and Tucker). But these 
trustees like the others held a life tenure and it was felt 
that the alumni still lacked the closeness of touch with 
the life of the College which they desired. In 1885 the 
question was again agitated and the final report of the 
committee then appointed to consider the matter 
recommended in 1888 the appointment by the alumni 
of a board of fifteen councillors. But this recom- 
mendation fell flat, and a new committee appointed in 
1890 proposed and carried through in 1S91, with the 
co-operation of the trustees, the scheme now in use, by 
which five members of the board are elected by the 
alumni, one retiring and one being chosen each year. 

President Bartlett gave up his office at Commence- 
ment, 1892 though he continued as a lecturer till his 
death in 1898. His successor, the Rev. William J. 
Tucker, D.D., was inaugurated at the Commencement 
of 1893 (June 28). The course of his administration is 
before our eyes and in our hearts. Its watchwords have 
been unity and enlargement, unity within and without, 
enlargement for the present and with thought for the 
future. At the very outset the Chandler School ceased 
to be a cause of friction and became a constituent part 
of the College, one of three courses on a common 
footing. The whole scheme of study has been re- 
modelled to make the closest connection with the 
schools below and to harmonize and economize time 
with the graduate schools. The courses of Senior year 
in particular have been so defined and related that 

78 



one year of time is saved in professional study. To John 
the other forces of the College has been added the Tuck King 
School of Administration and Finance, resting on the Lord 
princely gift of $400,000 by Mr. Edward Tuck of the 
class of 1862. For the material evidences of the pros- 
perity of the College you have but to look about you. 
Butterfield, Wilder, Richardson, Fayerweather and 
College Halls and the Heating Station have risen 
since 1893. The Administration Building is begun, 
Sanborn and Crosby Houses, the Chandler Building and 
the Medical College have been remodelled and enlarged, 
all the dormitories have been modernized by the in- 
troduction of heat, light and water, other property has 
been acquired with a view to future needs, the Alumni 
Oval has given a proper place for athletics, and a new 
and sufficient water supply for College and village 
has met the modern requirements that are dependent 
upon it for health and protection from fire. The 
general aspect of the College grounds and the village 
corresponds with this enlargement. The teaching force 
of the College has risen in this time to nearly twice its 
former number, and there has been a corresponding 
increase of students. What the standing of the College 
is among the alumni and its constituent public, you well 
know, but however firm it may be it cannot exceed the 
loyalty and peace ^yithin the College. 

If Daniel Webster, in whose honor we have met, 
were to stand among us to-day he could no longer say 
of Dartmouth as he did in the Supreme Court of the 
United States, " It is a small college," but he could still 
say , " There are those who love it." Yes, there are 
more to love it, and more w^ho love it. They cannot 

79 



John love more in degree than men in his day, for then men 
'^^Z g-ave their substance and even their lives to it, but thev 
■^-^'^ love it as much, and all over the land and in foreign 
lands, wherever the sons of Dartmouth have Sfone. their 
love burns true and strong, and in their hearts they 
"give a rouse for the College on the hill," and hope and 
labor for its prosperity. They believe in it now, they 
trust it for the future and looking at its history with its 
early romance and later struggles, seeing its progress 
through its century and a third of life with its present 
larger outlook, and regarding the long line of great and 
good men whom, like a "pure fountain," it has sent 
and still continues to send forth, they may justly say of 
the College as the great biographer of antiquity said of 
his hero, manet mansurumque est in animis bominum, 
in aeternitate temporum, fama rerum. 



80 



^he Exercises of 
Tuesday Evening 



Program. 

Formation of Torchlight Procession. 

Parade. 

Dartmouth Night Speeches, 

Melvin Ohio Adams, Esquire, *7J. 

Charles William Bartlett, Esquire, *65. 

Professor Charles Frederick Bradley, '73. 
Singing by the Glee Club. 
Fireworks. 
Bonfire. 

Athletic Events. 
Singing by the Entire Assemblage. 



T 



UESDAY evening was given to the spectacular 
demonstration of the Centennial, and to the ob- 
servance of Dartmouth Night. The town was 
aglow in honor of the occasion ; business blocks and 
residences were decorated with bunting, flags, and lan- 
terns ; the campus was in a blaze from the thousands of 
electric lamps which surrounded it ; College Hall, repre- 
senting the new Dartmouth was brilliantly lighted ; 
across the green stood Dartmouth, typical of the old 
College, each line of the venerable building, with its 
graceful belfry, distinct in the mellow light against the 
background of darkness. The illumination of this 
building was perfect : one well said of it, " Dartmouth 
has come to her own." Squarely across the front 
lighted letters spelled, " Daniel Webster 1801." 

83 



Dartmouth The torchlight procession formed under direction 

Night of Chief Marshal, Colonel Charles K. Darling, '85 ; 
Chief of Staff, Lieutenant Colonel Otis H. Marion, '73 ; 
and the Staff, Lieutenant Colonel Horace E. Marion, 
'66, Austin H. Kenerson, '76, Edward N. Pearson, '81, 
Benjamin Tenney, '83, Bertrand T. Wheeler, '84, 
John H. Colby, '85, Daniel B. Ruggles, '90, and Frank 
E. Barnard, '91. Philip M. Emmott, Sixth lufantr}-, 
M. V. ]\L, acted as Chief Bugler. 

The faculty wore black, academic gowns and mortar 
board caps ; the students a similar dress, except that 
each class was distinguished by a particular color, 
white for the Seniors, blue for the Juniors, scarlet for 
the Sophomores, and yellow for the Freshmen. The 
Glee Club was dressed in Colonial garb. The alumni 
appeared in a Webster costume of blue coat, buff waist- 
coat, stock, dicky, and tall hat. A band of students in 
Indian dress disported themselves about the procession. 
Floats, among them Webster's carriage, the great plow 
made and used by him at Marshfield, a reproduction of his 
room within which showed his old hat, chair, and table, 
and a representation of the first Dartmouth College 
building, were interspersed. Many transparencies were 
carried. 

The procession, led by the College Band, upon 
reaching the campus marched and countermarched, 
presenting a beautiful and striking appearance. The 
line of march was then taken up Main, across Maynard, 
and down College Streets. After completing the parade 
the procession came to a halt, and was massed before 
the reviewing stand where the trustees of the College 
were seated, together with the Governor and his Staff, 

84 



the invited guests, and the faculty, to listen to brief Dartmouth 
speeches from some of the alunmi, and to view the Night 
stereopticon pictures thrown upon a screen in front of 
Dartmouth Hall. The views were with two exceptions 
from original paintings and daguerreotypes. There were 
shown eighteen portraits of Mr. Webster, eight views of 
places and scenes important in his life, and the last 
manuscript page of his reply to Hayne. The Glee 
Club sang several selections. 

Immediately after this the bonfire was lighted, the 
display of fireworks took place, and a number of athletic 
events were run off upon the campus. Finally all 
joined in singing Dartmouth songs. 

DartmoutK Niglit SpeecKes. 

In introducing the speakers President Tucker said : 
"Gentlemen, this is 'Dartmouth Night.' We have 
simply moved out of doors. We cannot afford to miss 
altogether the good talking we have had from year to 
year in the Old Chapel. I take pleasure in introducing to 
you two or three of our brethren who will abundantly 
maintain the speaking habit under these changed con- 
ditions. First of all I will present Colonel Melvin O. 
Adams of Boston. ' ' 

Speech of Metbin Ohio Adams, Esquire, '7f . 

IMr. President. Gentlemen of the Board of Trustees, 
Your Excellency, Antique and Admirable Men [Laugh- 
ter], you who have come down to us from a former 
generation — at all events as far as your clothes are 
concerned [Laughter], and you thrice fortunate under- 
graduates of Dartmouth College of the year 1901, ap- 

55 



Dartmouth parently just hatched in all your radiance from this 
Night splendid lunar spectroscope — I salute you [Laughter]. 
Escaped from the wigwam after the " big talk " of the 
afternoon, you are now to congratulate yourselves that 
you are on the other side of Jordan^ in the green fields 
of Eden [Applause and laughter]. You seem to me 
an allegory of college life. For I beheld a modest per- 
centage easily pursuing their course, mounted on horses 
[Laughter], and by far a larger number slowly plodding 
along the average level of a fine college life, while a 
few, seated in carriages, rolled comfortably to honorary 
degrees, like my friend Gallagher who rode with me 
[Applause and laughter]. The College has thus put 
these men on her list and they do her perennial 
honor that more than squares the account [Applause.] 
But there is little time for talk. Non lusisti satis 
[Laughter and applause]. I call upon those brave 
mounted horsemen, the Colonel Darlings [Laughter 
and applause], the John Colbys, the Bert Wheelers, the 
Harry Deweys, who either rode or walked, we were 
uncertain which, to give me a free translation [Laugh- 
ter]. Even the president of the College fails to say 
that " he is prepared." Non lusisti satis — " You have 
not played enough"; and so I was admonished before I 
began to speak that I was given but five minutes. I 
am curious to know how that time is to be reckoned 
for if we are to be governed by the College bell; there 
was once a time when the minutes ran into hours 
[Laughter and applause] — and there was no tintinnabu- 
lation in the bell [Laughter], This was when my 
friend, Charlie Bartlett, who follows me, was in College 
[At this moment the great college bell rang out, amid 

86 



the laughter of the assembled multitude]. You see he Dartmouth 
has not been here long enough yet to stop it. I do not Night 
say it was a ^'■post^^ or a '^ propter^'''' — I only speak of 
the silence of the bell. 

But everybody knows, and if everybody does not 
know, they will know, that I am a small contingent 
from the Boston alumni. Twenty years ago, twenty 
men in Boston determined that the love of Dartmouth 
College should manifest itself by a positive exhibition of 
Dartmouth spirit [Applause]. The Dartmouth spirit 
meant that a Dartmouth man was as good as any other 
college man, and very often a little better. It meant 
that Dartmouth men were to stand together not for 
their own personal advantage, but to be a bulwark to 
the College ; and in the twenty years the twenty men 
have squared to four hundred men, and will soon cube 
them [Applause]. 

I have in my pocket an original letter, which I am 
to present to the librarian of the College to-morrow, 
written by Mr. Webster immediately after the decision 
of the famous Dartmouth College Case, dated in 1819; 
this letter was written to his associate, Mr. Joseph 
Hopkinson at Philadelphia, and in it he made this 
remarkable prophecy. He said to Mr. Hopkinson, — 
*' Our College cause will be known to our children's 
children. Let us take care that the rogues are not 
ashamed of their grandfathers." We, my fellow 
alumni, are the children's children. You are the 
rogues [Laughter] and we are not ashamed of our 
grandfathers. When Mr. Webster graduated there 
were ten men from Massachusetts in his class. To- 
day Massachusetts sends to this College three times as 

87 



Dartmouth many men as there were in the whole College a hundred 

Night years ago [Applause] ; but in the words of our Boston 

transparency, — " I shall enter on no encomium upon 

Massachusetts. There she is — behold her, and judge for 

yourselves." 

Far out at sea, beyond the gates of Boston Harbor, 
by an act of Congress, the Lighthouse Board has lately 
anchored a new light-ship. There the hardy pilots, 
coasting to meet the trans-Atlantic liner or the tall 
ships from Southern Seas, are ordered to keep it in 
sight by day and its twin lights by night. 

So it comes to me, looking back over the gap of a 
hundred years upon the memory, the character, and the 
public services of Daniel Webster that somehow he has 
been placed for us in the troublous sea of worldly 
struggle where each waits and waits for his token of 
success, as our college lightship, showing ever and 
always these two unobscured lights, these two principles 
of our college brotherhood, — the one, that the alumni 
is not a league of classes, but a great body in which we 
all are co-ordinate, equal members, — and the other, an 
abiding, persistent, sacrificial love for dear old Dart- 
mouth College [Great applause]. 

President Tucker then said : "That is so good we 
must have some more of the same kind, and I now call 
upon Charlie Bartlett, who will continue the story." 

Speech of Charles WiUiam 'Bartlett, Esquire, '69. 

I do not, Mr. President and Trustees, intend to 
remove any more of my rig, 1 must retain my Daniel 
Webster tile [Laughter and applause]. In front, em- 
blazoned on the hat, are the figures 1869. I was of that 

88 



vintage [Laughter]. For four long and somewhat active Dartmouth 
years I enjoyed the life at Dartmouth — some intermis- Night 
sions — and among the pleasant recollections that I have 
is that of the long years' attendance at the church 
on the corner, and careful remembrance of the texts 
[Laughter] from which the sermons were preached. . 
To-day I went agaiu. I heard Professor John K. Lord, 
Johnnie Lord, as we used to call him, for he was in the 
class of '68, and, will you believe it, he hazed me [Ap- 
plause and laughter and cheers for Johnnie]. Once — 
never after [Laughter and applause]. I listened with 
delight to the able and eloquent address that he de- 
livered there this afternoon. I listened to the various 
changes that he depicted; that such and such years 
chanees were made here at Dartmouth. When he fin- 
ished he ended with a quotation from some strange 
language [Laughter], Latin I have since been told. I 
have been endeavoring to find out ever since when it 
was that they changed the pronunciation; I was unable 
to follow that part of his address [Laughter]. I should 
dislike now — undergraduates I am talking to — to sit 
down and read my diploma in the original and read it 
in that way. I am afraid I should hardly recognize it. 
I followed the address with a great deal of pleasure when 
he referred to the year 1S69, the one hundredth class, 
gentlemen, the centennial class. I had the honor at 
that time to be Marshal and I know that Professor Lord's 
address must be absolutely correct for I remember that 
rain. I remember what a sight it was to me standing 
in the rear of about fifteen hundred alumni of Dart- 
mouth College sitting there, and, most astonishing fact 
of all, they followed the old rule, bald-headed fellows in 

8^ 



Dartmouth the front row [Laughter]. I have looked back a great 
Night many times to that celebration because to me, as a 
youngster, it was a great honor to lead that procession 
and to be followed directly, as we formed it at that time, 
by Chief Justice Chase, a graduate of this College, and 
General William T. Sherman. Now, coming down a 
little further, my brother Adams, whom I always 
assisted — he was in the class of '71 — I always coun- 
selled with good advice his class when it was in trouble 
— has referred to an incident in which he said that "the 
College clock was silent — there was no ringing, and 
there was no such thing as the tolling of the bell." He 
is mistaken. That bell was tolled by a stalwart man 
with a hammer, but he never left the hammer in the 
belfry [ Laughter] . 

Now, referring again to texts. There is a little 
text that has occurred to me, coming from a song dear 
to every Dartmouth man; it comes directl)- from that 
song : 

"The world will never have to call 
On Dartmouth men in vain," 
and on that text I could, if permitted, deliver 
an oration. But Professor Smith sent me formal 
notice that under no circumstances should I be per- 
mitted over five minutes, and with that time limitation 
I must be content. I might say that when Dartmouth 
called on Daniel Webster in the years gone by, she did 
not call in vain. The world did not call in vain upon 
other occasions, as the orators of this celebration will 
elaborately tell you to-morrow. The same spirit 
led Daniel Webster under circumstances where his 
ability could be shown and his love to the old College 

90 



could be shown, to respond as only a Dartmonth man Dartmouth 
could respond. I have the abidino: faith and belief that Night 
that spirit still lives and that, whenever the opportunity 
comes, whenever Dartmouth College calls, she never 
will call in vain on the boys that I see before me and 
the boys that I knew when I occupied the same position 
that you do [Applause]. I grieve to say that my five 
minutes is up [Applause]. 

President Tucker: "Gentlemen, it is hard for 
Boston to believe that it is not to-day what it has been 
as the Dartmouth Center. The center of gravity is 
moving westward, and is now pretty near Chicago. I 
have the honor of introducing to you the representative 
of the Chicago alumni, Professor Bradley." 

Speech of Professor Charles Frederick Bradley, '73. 
Walt Whitman said, " I love to study the Old Mas- 
ters. Oh ! that the Old Masters might come and study 
me ! " I should like to adopt his formula and say, "We 
men of Dartmouth love to study Daniel Webster. Oh ! 
that Daniel Webster might come to-night and study us." 
I believe he would find much to interest him. I am 
sure he never saw such a procession as has passed before 
this reviewing stand to-night, and I am sure that a pro- 
cession at Dartmouth is peculiarly suggestive to every 
alumnus returning to the College. It reminds me in 
the first place of a very different procession in honor of 
a very different Daniel. I think there must be a good 
many here who remember Daniel Pratt, the " Great 
American Traveler," and some of you doubtless helped 
to arrange a procession which escorted him from the old 
Dartmouth Hotel to Dartmouth Chapel, where they con- 

91 



Dartmouth ferred upon him with all solemnity the honorary degree 
Night of C. O. D. [Great laughter]. He then delivered a 
very remarkable oration upon the subject of the Vocah- 
ulahorntorv of the world's history [Great laughter]. 
After the address was over as he came out on the Chapel 
steps, some disturbance was caused, and brave man and 
chevalier though he was, he became frightened and 
started across the campus like a deer with the whole col- 
lege in full cry after him. The speakers to-night trust 
they will not be treated in the same way [Laughter]. 
I think, speaking of ^^ vocahulahoratories"' that there 
is an incident related of Daniel Webster which was not 
referred to by Professor Richardson this afternoon, and 
is not likely to be given by Mr. ]\IcCall to-morrow. It 
is said that a great admirer of Mr. Webster consulted a 
spiritualistic medium and the spirit of Webster was 
called up. This admirer was vev}' anxious to know 
what ]\Ir. Webster's feelings were regarding the speech 
of tlie seventh of March, and asked, "Will Mr. Webster 
tell what in his life he most deeply regrets?" and the 
answer given through the medium was, " My greatest 
regret is that I did not live to revise my Dictionary 
again" [Applause and laughter]. Whatever other 
trouble there was connected with Daniel Webster there 
surely was no trouble with his vocabulary. 

There are other processions of which I am reminded 
to-night, especially by these white-robed Seniors. 
These were night processions, too, and I shall ne\ er for- 
get my sensations as a Freshman, when following in one 
of these to the sound of college horns, we passed through 
a resounding corridor of Dartmouth Hall whose historic 
and felicitous name I shall not mention here, where, 

92 



amid the din of the horns and the resounding of the Dartmouth 
hoofs, it seemed, indeed, as if pandemonium had been Night 
let loose. Then there were also the processions of Class 
Day, when the departing Senior is wondering how the 
college world can exist without him, a question to be 
followed, alas ! often within a very few days, with an- 
other as to what the outside world can possibly do with 
him [Laughter]. 

And then there is that procession which certainly 
has stirred the heart of every Dartmouth man, the first 
Commencement procession in which he ever took part. 
How proudly as Freshman he followed the band, con- 
scious that at last he was in his proper place at the head 
of the procession. But what disappointment he suffered 
when at the Church doors he saw the procession halt and 
divide, and then like the anaconda boa constrictor "swal- 
low itself and crawl through itself ' ' leaving him at the 
end. 

But the procession at Dartmouth, so wonderfully 
presented to us to-night, is also suggestive, I think, to 
every one of us of the whole procession of Dartmouth 
men who are marching on, — the living and the dead, — a 
procession of men , and a procession of manly men . A pro- 
cession of brothers in a large sense. I do not say there are 
not other colleges, and many other colleges, where there 
is a brotherly spirit, but I do say there are some institu-"" 
lions which could not be called so much Alma Maters; 
so mechanical are they, so enormous their numbers, so 
lacking in the friendly and brotherly and motherly spirit 
that they are rather Alma Incubators [Laughter and 
applause]. We are brothers, — a thought dear to all 
Dartmouth men, — whether they are of our class or not, 

93 



Dartmouth -vvhether they are of our time or not. I say it advisedly, 
^^ght {.j^^i- y^ri^Q-^-^ I returned after twenty-five years to our 
class reunion it was one of the revelations of my life that 
I knew so intimately every member of the class who re- 
turned, and that we seemed to bear n relation to each 
other that was unlike any other in our experience. 
Dartmouth men, in a verv noble and verv beautiful 
sense, are all brothers, the world over. And hence it 
is that we so delight to honor those who are the great 
among us. Their glory is reflected upon us, their 
glory and their greatness inspires us. 

And so we are called upon, as Dartmouth men cele- 
brating this hundredth anniversary of the graduation of 
Dartmouth's most illustrious son, to be worthy brothers 
of Daniel Webster, to remember how he represented 
patriotism and statesmanship. None can rival him, 
none can equal his matchless oratory, none can com- 
mand the amazing forces of his colossal intellect, but 
we can all be patriots. We can all re-consecrate our- 
selves to the country he loved, and so gloriously gave 
his life to, most fittinglv at this time, in the shadow of 
the great national affliction which has befallen us, and 
just as a young man enters upon the Presidency of our 
nation who represents in an extraordinary degree, as no 
President ever did before, the idea of the university man 
devoting himself unselfishly to practical politics. As 
Dartmouth men we may not only put on the outward 
clothes that were so dignified in Daniel Webster [and 
so dignify these gentlemen of the alumni], but we may 
clothe ourselves in the civic virtues for which he was 
distinguished. In that great procession I call upon you, 

94 



gentlemen, to give three cheers for three great brothers Dartmouth 
of Dartmouth — Eleazar Wheelock, the great, wise, he- Night 
roic founder ; Daniel Webster, the illustrious statesman 
and matchless orator and re-founder ; and William 
Jewett Tucker, the ideal president and great extender 
[Great applause followed by three cheers]. 



95 



'^he E<xercises of 
Wednesday Moming 



Program. 

A procession made op of trustees with invited guests, 

faculty, alumni and students formed in the QjIIege Yard at 

9.30 o'clock, and marched to the College Church. 

Processional — " Coronation March from The Prophet.*' 

cMeyerbeer 
Salem Cadet Band. 

Chorus—*' Sanctus in E flat." Osgood 

Prayer by the Reverend Arthur Little, D.D., '60, of Dorches- 
ter, Massachusetts. 

Chorus— "Prayer of Thanksgiving." Old Netherlands (1626) 

Address by the President of the College. 

Oration by the Honorable Samuel "Walker McCall, *74, of 
Massachusetts. 

Chorus— "Ein Feste Burg." Old German 

Conferring of Honorary Degrees. 

The singing by the chorus and congregation of Milton's 
paraphrase of Psalm CXXXVI. 

Benediction by the Reverend Arthur Little, D.D. 



Introductory Address 

By the President of the College. 

Ti HE observance of the Centennial of ]\Ir. Webster's 
^ graduation from College is an academic event 

^^^ of its own kind. I am not aware of an instance 
in which a college has taken note in a formal way of 
the graduation of any of its alumni. The motive which 
has led us to observe this event is so natural and evi- 
dent, that our action invites, I think, neither criticism 
• L.oTG. 99 



The nor imitation. We have not sought to introduce a cus- 
President torn. No college or university may see fit to celebrate 
of the a like event in its hist or}-. We may have no occasion 
College ^Q repeat these observances under other conditions. 

The relation of Mr. Webster to his College, his 
living and his posthumous relation, is unique. It is 
doubtful if the name of any educational institution in 
the land is so inseparably blended with the name of a 
graduate, or even of a founder, as is the name of Dart- 
mouth with that of Daniel Webster. The story of the 
founding of this College by Eleazar Wheelock is a ro- 
mance, the great educational romance of the eighteenth 
century. The story of its "re-founding" by Daniel 
Webster is written in law, the law of the land since 
1820. Had Mr. Webster died immediately after the 
Dartmouth College decision he would have left the Col- 
lege imbedded in the national life. The after years of 
his personal fame were of almost equal service to the 
College. His reputation, his influence, his memory' be- 
came a part of our institutional assets. We cannot tell 
to-day whether we owe more to Mr. Webster for what 
he did or for what he was. 

And yet in this relation of Mr. Webster to the Col- 
lege, unique as it is, there is nothing unnatural or ex- 
aggerated. He belongs to us because he was one of us. 
There was nothing to set him apart or separate him, 
except size. He was ''to the manor born." A New 
Hampshire boy, he never thought of entering any other 
college than Dartmouth. And once here he found all 
that he needed at that stage of his development. The 
Dartmouth of Mr. Webster's time was quite abreast of 
the still older colleges with which it is associated. 

JOO 



During tlie decade which included the greater part of The 
his collegiate course, Dartmouth graduated three hun- President 
dred and sixty-three men, Harvard three hundred and of the 
ninety-four, Yale two hundred and ninety-five, and College 
Princeton two hundred and forty. Mr. Webster re- 
ferred in his argument to Dartmouth as a "small col- 
lege." It was a small college, but not small as related 
to its neio-hbors, nor insufficient as related to its work. 
It gave ^Ir. Webster what he was capable of receiving 
in the way of instruction, stimulus and opportunity. 
And wdien the time came for him to repay his debt to 
the College he simply did his duty. He did no more 
than he ought to have done, no more than any graduate 
ought to do for his college with a like opportunity be- 
fore him and with equal resources at his command. It 
was natural, too, that he should continue to love his 
college to the end, and rejoice that he was apart of it, 
as natural as was his love of kindred and of nature. I 
dwell upon the simplicity and constancy of Mr. Web- 
ster's feeling toward the College, because these qualities 
explain so largely our feeling toward him. His loyalty 
was commensurate with his power of service, his af- 
fection was as deep as his nature. 

We, therefore, who are reaping the fruits of his 
devotion, have taken the earliest opportunity, that af- 
forded by the centennial of his graduation, to express 
our gratitude and pride. The first suggestion of the 
present observance, so far as I know, certainly antici- 
pating my own thought, came from a class-mate, Mr. 
David H. Brown of Boston. I soon found, however, 
that the thought was in many minds, and the feeling in 
many hearts. The sentiment obtained everywhere 



The among the alumni that there should be some appropriate 

President recognition of the anniversary of Mr. Webster's gradua- 

of thetion. At a meeting of the trustees, held on January 

College nineteenth, 1900, it was decided to take definite action 

as indicated bv the following resolution : 

" In view of the fact that the Commencement of 
iQOi will be the one hundredth armiversary of the 
graduation of Daniel Webster, whose supreme service 
to the College in recovering and re-establishing its 
chartered rights calls for recognition on the part of the 
sons of Dartmouth : 

" Be it voted that the centennial of ]\Ir. Webster's 
graduation be observed as an academic occasion at 
Hanover, at such time in the year 1901 and in such 
manner as may be appropriate, to be participated in by 
the faculty, students, alumni, and friends of the Col- 
lege." 

In accordance with the terms of this resolution the 
commemoration which is now taking place is personal 
and institutional rather than academic in its broad sense. 
We have not asked other colleges and the universities 
to join with us in this celebration. We did not wish, 
as I have said, to seem to inaugurate an academic cus- 
tom, neither did we wish to prejudice an obser\'ance by 
the College some years hence of a strictly academic 
event or combination of events. The year 1919 will be 
the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the signing 
of the charter of the College, and the one hundredth 
anniversary of the decision in the Dartmouth College 
Case. We leave to our successors the honor of obser\-ing 
that year as a great academic occasion. Whatever the 
present occasion may lack, however, on the academic 

102 



side is more than met by its significance as a civil event. The 
This celebration opens to us not only Mr. Webster's President 
college life and his argument for the College, but his of the 
whole career. We have asked the presence of the State College 
at this time in the person of His Excellency, the 
Governor of New Hampshire, and of his Councilors and 
Staff, in the person of the members of the Judiciary, 
and of the representatives of the Legislature. We have 
sought the informal co-operation of the neighboring 
State in which so much of Mr. Webster's professional 
and political life was passed, and we are honored by the 
gracious response of the senior Senator from Massa- 
chusetts. We have invited the recognition of the 
Government at Washington, and its august representa- 
tive is with us in the person of the Chief Justice of the 
United States. 

It may be pardonable to add to this word of ex- 
planation the reminder of the fact that as we celebrate 
this past event we find ourselves in the presence of a 
living personality. No man of his time has borne the 
gradual transfer from memory to tradition with so little 
loss. No name out of his time is so familiar to-day as 
his name. Mr. Webster w^as never loved by the people 
at large as some men have been loved. Popular affec- 
tion as it went out toward him grew hesitant in the 
approach and became awed in his presence. It did not 
quite dare that passionate fondness which some men allow 
in their success ; it did not dare that compassionate ten- 
derness which some men would welcome, which he 
might have welcomed, in decline and defeat. But in 
one respect the personal influence of ]Mr. Webster sur- 
passed and continues to surpass that of all other men, 

103 



The namely , in his influence over the ambitions of young men. 
President Durin.o^ his life-time Mr. Beecher had many imitators. 
oi the ^jj. Webster's power was deeper, more searching, more 
College creative. It touched the center and core of personal 
ambition, stirring young men to make the most of them- 
selves and to act with most effect upon others. Mr. 
Webster has been and still is a potent influence in send- 
ing men to college, into the law, and into politics. 

Measured in broader terms his influence is vital to- 
day in the thought and feelings of men in respect to the 
country. We have learned, we have begun to learn, to 
think about the country in his terms, and to feel about 
it as he felt. His conceptions were so gi'eat that they 
could find room onlv in his own mind. Thev belong 
to the United States of to-day, not to the nation of his 
time. Thus far Mr. Webster is the only man who has 
comprehended the American people. Until a greater 
American than he shall arise, he will live in the still 
unfulfilled destiny of the Republic. 



"Webster Ceiiter\iiial Oration. 

^y the Honorable Samuel Walker SMcCall, '74, of 

cMassachusetts. 
President Tucker, and Ladies and Gentlemen : 
-. y 1 EARLY half a century has elapsed .since the Col- 
1^ lege gave formal expression to its sorrow at the 
death of Daniel Webster. The life of that great 



statesman had just ended. On this very spot Rufus 
Choate spoke his eulogy. Sympathy in a common po- 
litical cause and the attachment of a life-long friendship 
stimulated an almost unrivaled gift of eloquence to the 
production of a masterpiece among orations of that na- 

104 



ture, a speech of which Mr. Everett expressed the opin- Samuel 
ion that it was " as magnificent a eulogium as was ever Walker 
pronounced." It was a time for the eulogy of friends, McCall 
and for the expression of a sense of desolateness over 
the departure of so transcendent a figure, but it was no 
time for a just estimate of Webster either as a man or a 
statesman. His career had been too great to be compre- 
hended by a near view. It demanded that perspective 
without which only a distorted outline of vast objects 
can be obtained. The passion of partisanship was hot 
and surging. Above the deep tones of praise arose the 
sharp clamor of detraction. Across the horizon which 
shut out the near future could be heard the beating of 
the drums which he had set throbbing for the Union. 
The chief work of his life was yet to be tried in the fur- 
nace of civil war. It required that most inexorable of 
all tests — the test of time. 

Transient movements and the mere noises of un- 
substantial reputations have had time to pass into the 
silence of oblivion. A generation that knew him not 
has come upon the scene. We can now see something 
of the proper and ultimate relations of events. We are 
now able somewhat dispassionately to judge. The ob- 
servance, amid general approval, of this unique occasion 
bears its own eloquent tribute. That so many who oc- 
cupy positions of responsibility and distinction, and to 
whom Webster is merely a historical personage, should 
come here to-day, as to a shrine, from all parts of the 
country, fifty years after he has disappeared from the 
view of men, is of striking significance. The loadstone 
that draws you is his fame. Obviously the stupendous 
events of that half century have not dwarfed him. The 

105 



Samuel distance at which most of us disappear hardly serves to 

Walker bring out his heroic proportions, and we are here to-day 

McCall |-Q ^Q homage to a statesman who easily takes rank as 

the foremost figure in our parliamentary history. 

The task of fully reviewing his career goes far be- 
yond the limits of this occasion. I shall endeavor to 
set before you some estimate of him as a lawyer, an ora- 
tor, and a statesman, and shall recall to your minds some 
of the great principles of government with which he was 
identified. I shall ask you also to look at him for a mo- 
ment in the supreme relation in which he stood to his 
fellow men; for back of the orator, or statesman, or law- 
yer there stands the essential thing that is manifested in 
them, there stands the man. 

And I should fail to perform the most obvious duty 
if I did not refer to his relations to the College which 
helped to nurture his genius and towards which he bore 
a filial love. When he entered the College more than 
one hundred years ago it had attained a considerable de- 
gree of prosperity. For a quarter of a century after 
Wheelock planted it in the wilderness it remained the 
only college in northern New England, and the rapid 
settlement of the country about it gave it a constituency 
respectable in numbers and still more respectable in 
character. Webster came from one of the frontier fami- 
lies that crowded into this region. When the smoke 
first curled from the chimney of his father's log cabin in 
Salisbury, there was, as the son has said, " no similar 
evidence of a white man's habitation between it and the 
settlements on the rivers of Canada." Professor Wen- 
dell tells us in his scholarly book on American literature 
that Webster was the ' ' son of a New Hampshire coun- 

106 



try man," and again, that " he retained so many traces of Samuel 
his far from eminent New Hampshire origin ' ' that he was Walker 
less typical of the Boston orators than were some other McCall 
men. It is true that the father was a "New Hampshire 
countryman," and he does not appear to have attained 
any remarkable eminence. But only the most cautious 
inference should be drawn from a surface or negative 
fact of that character, in a past necessarily covered for 
the most part with darkness. A great deal is to-day un- 
known about that sturdy race of men who swarmed 
over our frontiers more than a century ago, and especial- 
ly a great deal that was worthy and noble in individuals. 
And it is hardly useful to turn to a doubtful past in or- 
der to learn of a known present, or to judge of a son 
whom we know well from a father of whom we know 
but little. It is often more safe to judge of the an- 
cestor from the descendant than of the descendant from 
the ancestor. I supposed that Daniel Webster had for- 
ever settled the essential character of the stock from 
which he sprung, just as the pure gold of Lincoln's 
character unerringly points to a mine of unalloyed met- 
al somewhere, if there is anything in the principles of 
heredity ; and whether the mine is known or unknown, 
its gold will pass current even at the Boston mint. Per- 
haps neither of these men in himself or in his origin 
was wholly typical of any place, but it is enough that 
they were typical of America. But what we know of 
Webster's father indicates the origin of some of the 
great qualities of the son. He was a man of much na- 
tive strength of intellect and of resolute independence of 
character. He was an officer in the Revolutionary army, 
and, although never trained to the law, was thought fit 

t07 



Samuel to be appointed to a judicial ofHceof considerable impor- 
walkertance. He had those magnificent physical qualities 
McCall ■^v]iic|^ made the son a source of wonder to all who knew 
him. He had, too, a heart which, the son once said, 
" he seemed to have borrowed from a lion." "Your 
face is not so black, Daniel," Stark once said "as your 
father's was with gunpowder at the Bennington fight." 
And on the night after the discovery of Arnold's trea- 
son, at that dark moment when even the faithful might 
be thought faithless, and the safety of the new nation 
demanded a sure arm to lean upon, it was then, accord- 
ing to the tradition, that Webster was put in command 
of the guard before the headquarters of our general, and 
George Washington, another "countryman," said, 
"Captain Webster, I believe I can trust you." 

I have alluded to the prosperity which the College 
soon attained on account of the rapid settlement of this 
region. During the ten years immediately preceding 
the year of Webster's graduation it was second among 
the colleges of the country in the number of graduates 
to the degree of Bachelor of Arts. But whatever may 
have been its relative rank the one thing most certainly 
known about it now is that it was a small college. The 
pathetic statement of Webster in the argument of its 
cause at the bar of the Supreme Court has settled that 
fact for all time. It is true that it was a day of small 
things, but the smallness of contemporary objects was 
not immortalized by the touch of genius, which has it in 
its power to endow with perpetual life any passing con- 
dition or mood in the life of a man or an institution. 
Fifty generations have grown old and died since the 
Greek artist carved his marble urn, but the maiden and 

108 



her lover chiselled there are still young, and to the im- Samuel 
mortality conferred by art has been added the immortal- "Walker 
ity of poetry in the noble verse of Keats : "Forever wilt McCall 
thou love and she be fair." 

The College has grown wonderfully in the century 
since Webster left her. It is our hope that the pros- 
perity of her past may be eclipsed by the prosperity of 
her future. But however great she may become here- 
after, the genius of her son has made it impossible to be 
forgotten that she was once a small college. 

The schooling of Webster before he entered college 
was of a very limited character. He appears to have 
been well drilled in Latin, but he possessed only the 
rudiments of English, and of Greek he knew very little. 
It must not be overlooked, however, that even at his 
early age he had acquired a fondness for the Spectator 
and for other good English books. While in college he 
broadened his reading of English and history until he 
was said to be at the head of his class in those branches. 
Perhaps his most positive acquirement was in the Latin 
language, in which he became a good scholar and which 
he continued to study in after life. A profound knowl- 
edge of a foreign tongue can hardly be conclusively in- 
ferred from frequent quotations from it. In the oratory 
of the first half of the last century the Latin quotation 
was an established institution, and for much of it little 
more than the manual custody of the Latin author was 
apparently necessary. But the quotations from that 
language in Webster's speeches were apt and usually 
betrayed an insight into the meaning of the author, deep 
enough often to get a second or poetical meaning. He 
continued to neglect Greek, probably because he had 

109 



Samuel 
Walker 
McCall 



been so miserably prepared in it, and long afterwards he 
lamented that he had not studied it until he could read 
and understand Demosthenes in his own tongue. The 
course of study which he followed was the rigid and un- 
yielding course of that day, where every branch was im- 
partially prescribed for everybody. Mr. Ticknor is au- 
thority for the statement that the instruction in the Col- 
lege was meagre. This appears to have been a fault of 
the times rather than a particular fault of the College; 
for a dozen years after Webster's graduation, and in 
Boston, "Sir. Ticknor himself succeeded in getting the 
necessary books to study German only with the greatest 
difliculty. He discovered a text-book in the Boston 
Athenaeum which appears to have been so much of a 
curiosity that it was deposited there by John Ouincy 
Adams on going abroad ; and then he was forced to send 
to New Hampshire for a dictionary. But however nar- 
row the course of study compared with that of the mod- 
ern college, it contained the means of much excellent 
discipline and the years spent in its pursuit laid the foun- 
dation of a broad culture and prepared the way for the 
development of thinkers and scholars. The debating 
society was an institution to which Webster was devoted 
and from which he derived great benefit. It enabled 
him to overcome his timidity which had been so great 
at Exeter that it was impossible for him to recite his 
declamations before the school, and he became in col- 
lege a ready and self-possessed debater. I do not find it 
easy, however, to detect under the flowers of his early 
rhetoric the promise of that weighty and concentrated 
style which afterwards distinguished him. But his col- 
lege efforts were a necessary part of his intellectual de- 

no 



velopment. It was better that the inborn desire to ut- Samuel 
ter fine words without meaning should be satisfied in Walker 
youth, when it could be satisfied with comparative safe- McCall 
ty, than that it should be restrained at the risk of grati- 
fication when he came to perform the sober duties of 
life. Although not the first in scholarship he un- 
doubtedly acquired a leadership among his college 
mates. His popularity was the natural result of the dis- 
play of his ability and manly qualities in that most just 
and perfect democracy in the world — a democracy of 
schoolboys. It lingered in the College after he left it; 
and when he returned after his graduation with the 
"shekels," as he expressed it, which he had earned for 
his brother Ezekiel, he was received as quite a hero. 

It is difficult to believe, in view of the majestic pro- 
portions of his later years, that he was ever slender and 
delicate, but he is spoken of as being in his college days 
" long, slender, pale and all eyes." But his slight 
form supported an enormous mass of head, with its no- 
ble brow crowned by hair as black as the wing of a rav- 
en. Undoubtedly his most striking features were 
those wonderful black eyes, which near the end of his 
life Carlyle spoke of as "dull anthracite furnaces, need- 
ing only to be blown," but which were then lighted up 
with the fire and brilliancy of youth. His nature un- 
folded itself slowly. Far from being forward it required 
a strong effort for him to overcome his bashfulness. He 
displayed while in college the qualities of a large, 
undeveloped nature and led a careless, happy and some- 
what indolent existence. 

There was that in his appearance at that early day 
which arrested attention and dispensed with the neces- 



Samuel sity of the ordinary introduction. Soon after leaving 
Walker college he entered the law office of the accomplished 
McCall Christopher Gore of Boston, presented by one as un- 
known as himself, who could not or did not speak his 
name, — under circumstances surely that would not 
ordinarily secure a hearing, much less employment of a 
confidential character, but the attention of the busy 
lawyer and man of the world was at once secured and 
Webster was told to go to work. His connection with 
Gore proved of great value, not so much because it gave 
him an opportunity to study his profession, under as 
favorable conditions probably as then existed, but 
because Gore's advice deterred him from taking a step 
which might have kept him from his great career. 
Webster was offered the clerkship of a New Hampshire 
court with a salary which, in his circumstances, was a 
tempting one, and he had no other thought than to 
accept it. Gore clearly saw that he was capable of 
performing a far higher part in the world, and he doubt- 
less saw, too, the danger that the competency which the 
place offered might tempt him from making the hard 
struggle necessary to establish himself at the bar. He 
strongly urged Webster to decline the position and thus 
rendered him a great service in keeping him upon the 
arduous road. It was a fortunate circumstance, too, in 
his early career that it fell to his lot to meet often in 
the courts so great a lawyer as Jeremiah Mason. When 
Webster came to the Portsmouth bar he found Mason 
its unquestioned leader. Mason was a giant mentally 
and physically, thoroughly trained in his profession, 
with an absolute contempt for rhetorical ornament, and 
a way of talking directly at juries in a terse and informal 

112 



stvle which they could comprehend, standing, as Samuel 
Webster expressed it, so that he might put his finger Walker 
on the foreman's nose. Long afterwards, whenWebster's McCall 
fame as a lawj-er and statesman extended over the whole 
country, he wrote it as his deliberate opinion of Mason 
that if there was a stronger intellect in the country he 
did not know it. From this estimate he would not 
even except John Marshall. Webster quickly outstripped 
his other rivals, and for nine years he maintained the 
struggle against this formidable antagonist for supremacy 
at the Portsmouth bar. He was compelled to overcome 
his natural tendency to indolence and to make the most 
careful preparation of his cases. The rivalry called 
into play the most strenuous exercise of all his faculties. 
The intellectual vigilance and readiness which became 
his marked characteristics in debate were especially 
cultivated. He soon saw the futility of florid declamation 
against the simple style of iNIason, and his own elo- 
quence rapidly passed out of the efflorescent stage and 
became direct and full of the Saxon quality, although 
he never affected little words and would use a strong 
word of Latin origin when it would answer his purpose. 
When his practice at the Portsmouth bar came to an 
end he had proved his ability to contend on even terms, 
at least, with IMason, and he had developed those great 
qualities which enabled him to take his place as the 
leader of the Boston bar, almost without a struggle, 
and to step at an early age into the front rank of the 
lawyers who contended in the Supreme Court at 
Washington. 

This occasion demands more than a passing refer- 
ence to the cause in which Webster gained a recognized 

n3 



Samuel place among the leaders of the bar of the national 
Walker Supreme Court, for it possesses a double importance to 
McCall us to-day. It marked an epoch in his professional 
career and it vitally concerned the existence of this 
College. The Dartmouth College causes grew out of 
enactments of the New Hampshire legislature, making 
amendments in the charter which differed little from 
repeal. These acts did not spring primarily from a 
desire to improve the charter, but were the outgrowth 
of a division in the board of trustees, one of the parties 
endeavoring to secure by legislation the control which 
it had lost in the board itself. In substance the leeis- 
lative acts created a new corporation and transferred to 
it all the property of the College. There would have 
been little security in the charters of colleges or of 
similar establishments in this countrv if state legislatures 
generally had possessed the power to pass acts of that 
sweeping character. The trustees made a struggle for 
self-preservation against great odds. The dominant 
political forces in the state were hostile; the legislature 
was against them; and, as it turned out, the Supreme 
Court of the state was against them also. The contest 
was first made in the state court, and it is rare that there 
has ever been brought together in a trial in any court 
such an array of lawyers as appeared in the little court- 
room at Exeter. Webster appeared for the College. 
He had with him Jeremiah Mason and Jeremiah Smith. 
Webster and Mason formed a combination which could 
not be surpassed in strength by that of any other two 
lawyers at the American bar, while Smith, the former 
chief justice of the state, was probably its most learned 
lawyer. It is no disparagement of the counsel against 

IJ4 



the College to say that they were overmatched. They Samuel 
were, however, great lawyers, Sullivan the attorney- "Walker 
general, and Ichabod Bartlett, a hard fighter and an McCall 
ingenious and eloquent advocate. Both sides were fully 
prepared in the state court, and it may w-ell be doubted 
whether New Hampshire has ever witnessed such 
another intellectual contest as took place at Exeter over 
the College charter. Webster's speech does not appear 
in the printed report ot the proceedings in the state 
court. He was the only one of the counsel on either side 
in the New Hampshire court who took part at Washing- 
ton, and he apparently did not wish to be reported twice 
in the same cause. But at Exeter he closed for his side 
in a speech of great brilliancy; and his " Csesar in the 
Senate House" peroration, which is said to have 
brought tears to the eyes of John Marshall at Washing- 
ton, was spoken in substance and with thrilling effect. 
The decision of the New Hampshire court was against 
the College and disposed of the point which appeared 
to be the strongest in its case, that the legislature was 
inherently incapable of passing the acts in question 
because vested rights could not be taken away without a 
judgment which could be rendered only by the judiciary. 
It also settled the claim that the statutes in question 
were in contravention of the constitution of New^ Hamp- 
shire. The simple ground of appeal to the federal 
Supreme Court lay in the contention that the College 
charter was a contract and was under the protection of 
that clause of the federal constitution wdiich prohibited 
states from passing laws impairing the obligation of 
contracts. Webster did indeed state the whole argument 
before the court at Washington, but only for the pur- 
US 



Samuel pose of illustration and ver^- likely also for collateral 

Walker effect upon the court. 

McCall The point upon which the court had jurisdiction 

was regarded by the College counsel as a forlorn hope 
and to be more daring and novel than sound. It ap- 
parently originated with ]\Iason. It was, however, the 
only ground open on the appeal, and this was a fortunate 
circumstance for the fame of the cause. If the whole 
cause had been subject to review it might well have 
been decided upon one of the other grounds, and thus 
it would not have become one of the great land- 
marks of constitutional law. Wirt, who was then the 
attorney-general of the United States, and Holmes 
appeared at Washington against the College, and 
Hopkinson wnth W^ebster in its favor. It must be 
admitted that Webster possessed an advantage over the 
other counsel. He had fought over the ground, when 
it was most stubbornly contested, and knew^ every inch 
of it. His wdiole soul was in his case. He had the 
briefs of I\Iason and Smith as well as his own and had 
absorbed every point in all the great arguments on his 
side at Exeter. He generously gave all the credit to 
Smith and IMason. He w^as interested in preventing 
the printing of the Exeter speeches because, he said, it 
would show where he got his plumes. This was 
undoubtedly too generous, but his debt was a great one, 
and no lawyer was ever better prepared than Webster 
was when he rose to speak in the College cause. He 
possessed too as great a mastery of his opponents' 
arguments as of his own. With his extraordinary 
power of eloquence thus armed it is not strange that the 
court was to witness a revelation and that he was 

ii6 



destined to a great personal triumph. He took the Samuel 
part of junior counsel and opened the argument, but "Walker 
when he took his seat after five hours of high reason McCall 
and clear statement, kindled with tremendous passion 
and delivered with all the force of his wonderful 
personality, the case had been both opened and closed 
and nothing remained to be said. The spectators were 
astonished and overawed. It is not to be wondered at 
that IMarshall sat enchained and that Story forgot to 
take notes. The counsel against the College were far 
from being so well prepared. Webster afterwards wrote 
a letter to Wirt complimenting him upon his argument 
and Wirt apparently satisfied himself; but the tremendous 
performance by Webster took his antagonists by sur- 
prise. The personal triumph of the latter was complete 
and it was followed by the triumph of his cause. The 
argument won over Stor}^, who had been counted on by 
the opponents of the College, as the reading of it after- 
wards won over Chancellor Kent, who had at first ap- 
proved the decision of the New Hampshire court. A 
majority of the court was carried, and carried probably 
by the eloquence of the advocate ; the College was 
saved, and at the same time there was witnessed the 
birth of a great principle of constitutional law and of a 
great national fame. 

There have been arguments before the same high 
tribunal more discursively eloquent, more witty, and 
delivered wnth a greater parade of learning; but in the 
boldness, novelty, and far reaching character of the 
propositions advanced, in the strength with which they 
were maintained, in the judgment with which the points 
of argument were selected and the skill with which 

U7 



Samuel they were pressed upon the court, in the natural 
"Walker oratorical passion, so consuming that for five hours the 
McCall spectators were held spellbound by a discussion of 
questions of law, no greater speech was ever made 
before the Supreme Court. No other advocate in that 
tribunal ever equalled what he himself never surpassed. 
The published report of this speech is apparently much 
condensed and contains only the outlines of what was 
said. There is no hint of the beautiful peroration. 
IVIr. Ticknor says of the printed version that those who 
heard him when the speech was delivered ' ' still wonder 
how such dry bones could ever have lived with the power 
they there witnessed and felt." But even the printed 
version is a classic in its severe simplicity and beauty. 
Although this was not the first cause argued by Webster 
before the national high court, it especially marked the 
beginning of a career which continued for more than a 
third of a century and stamps him on the whole as the 
greatest figure who ever appeared at that august bar. 

And here at this first high point in his professional 
career it may be appropriate to take a view of him as an 
advocate and a lawyer. His greater fame doubtless was 
won as a statesman and political orator because it was 
won in a broader forum, but to him belons^s the rare 
distinction of pre-eminence in Congress and the courts. 
It is sometimes said that there is an incompatibility in 
the qualities that make a great advocate and a great 
parliamentary orator. Certainly there are instances of 
men who were highly successful in one capacity and 
who failed in the other. But such instances will 
usually be found where eminence was gained in one 
career, and mental habits adjusted to its demands before 



the other bei^an. Webster entered upon his double Samuel 
career early in life and his development in each branch Walker 
of it contributed to his development in the other. McCall 
He had scarcely become established at the bar before he 
engaged in the public service and he pursued both 
careers concurrently during the remainder of his life. 
His efforts at the bar made him more definite and 
accurate in the Senate and his experience as a statesman 
broadened him as a lawyer. His qualities became 
equally commanding in both fields. 

He was doubtless excelled in some departments of 
his profession by other lawyers; Curtis was more deeply 
versed in the law; Choate surpassed him, as, indeed, he 
surpassed all others in the constant brilliancy of his ad- 
vocacy before juries, although Webster made one speech 
to a jury which Choate never equalled. But I think it 
can be said without exaggeration that, more nearly than 
any other, Webster filled the large circle of requirements 
for that high place, and that he stands at the head of the 
whole American bar. 

He has often been contrasted with William Pinck- 
nev, I suppose because the latter during the first thirty 
years of the court's history was the most conspicuous 
figure at its bar. They were never fairly measured di- 
rectly against each other. Webster came prominently 
into view just as Pinckney's sun was setting. When he 
argued the Dartmouth College Case he was only thirty- 
six years old and had had barely a dozen years of prac- 
tice, most of it in a small New Hampshire town where 
the causes were neither numerous nor important. Al- 
though he would not suffer by the comparison it would 
be obviously unfair to take him at this comparatively 

119 



Samuel immature period and place him by the side of a seasoned 
Walker veteran like Pinckney, who was seventeen years his 
McCall senior, and who possessed the great prestige and develop- 
ment which came from having worthily filled the most 
important offices of the government, and from his great 
practice before the Supreme Court, at the bar of which 
he was the acknowledged leader. A fairer comparison 
would be between Pinckney at the summit of his fame, 
when he attempted to press for a re-argument of the Col- 
lege cause and John Marshall turned his "blind eye" 
towards him, and Webster at the same age and period of 
his career, after he had argued that long line of impor- 
tant constitutional causes, had delivered the Bunker 
Hill oration and the reply to Hayne, had become known 
abroad and his own countrv runo; with his fame, and 
when he stood the unchallenged leader of a far larger, 
if not a greater, bar. Pinckney was a great and learned 
lawyer, a brilliant orator and capable of close and 
abstract reasoning. But his style was often balanced 
and artificial, disfigured by affectation, and contained 
much diffuse declamation. Its faults as well as its 
merits may be strikingly seen in the famous argument 
in the Nereide case, of which John oNIarshall said in the 
opinion of the court, " With a pencil dipped in the 
most vivid colors and guided by the hand of a master a 
splendid portrait has been drawn." It will appear 
from the very full report of that argument which sur- 
vives that the father of American jurisprudence was 
hardly so safe a judge of literary coloring as of law. As 
to Webster's art, if as an advocate he can be credited 
with art, it was so concealed that the chief justice was 
not called upon consciously to exercise his faculties as 

(20 



a judge of coloring. Take Pinckney's greatest efforts at SamocI 
the bar, in the Senate, or in diplomacy, and compare Walker 
them with corresponding efforts of Webster and I McGall 
believe the superiority of the latter will be distinctly 
seen. 

It is sometimes said of Webster that he was not 
learned in the law. But in the very best sense of the 
term he was a learned lawyer. If his mind was not an 
encyclopedia of cases it was a storehouse of legal 
principles. He was not the man to make a pedantic 
parade and to obscure the essential point under a great 
mass of quotations from cases. He did not have the 
habit of irrelevant citation, nor did he throw upon the 
court the burden of winnowing a little wheat from an 
enormous quantity of chaff. He had the art of conden- 
sation and would select the genuine points of his case 
and put them with unsurpassed simplicity and weight. 
He possessed to a remarkable degree, too, the inborn 
legal sense without which there can be no lawyer. From 
the day when, a mere stripling, he graduated from this 
College, the law was his chief study. The necessities 
of his great practice imposed it upon him. Usually act- 
ing as senior counsel in important cases, he had the ad- 
vantage of the preparation of learned juniors. He was 
called upon in court to display a mastery of his own side 
and to hear and meet all that could be said by great law- 
yers against it. His memory was prodigious. The 
result of it all was that with his great natural powers thus 
disciplined by forty years of practice, one would have 
been willing to back him, not merely as a parliamentary 
Hercules, as Carlyle said, but as a legal Hercules, 
against the whole extant world. 

S2I 



Samuel A great part of a lawyer's work is ephemeral and 

Walker perishes with the day that brought it forth. Some of 
McCall the miracles which Rufus Choate wrought in the courts 
were a nine days' wonder, passed into splendid tra- 
ditions, and were then forgotten. This is due to the 
fact that while there are many causes of vast consequence 
to individuals there are comparatively few which are of 
importance to society generally or in the development 
of the law. But a great mass of Webster's legal work 
survives and ensures him a permanent fame as a lawyer. 
Take for instance the case of Gibbons and Ogden, where 
the State of New York had attempted to grant a mo- 
nopoly of navigation on the waters under its juris- 
diction. The doctrine which Webster contended for in 
that case was sustained by the court. In a time when 
so much is said of the evils of granting franchises in the 
public streets, we can appreciate the far-reaching im- 
portance of a decision which at one stroke forever 
rescued our great lakes and harbors and the Mississippi 
and the Ohio from the grasp of monopolies and left our 
inland waters open highways for all to navigate on equal 
terms. In the formative period of our institutions, 
when their limits were explored in the courts and es- 
tablished by judicial construction, there were great 
judges besides ^Marshall and great lawyers besides Web- 
ster. But Marshall stands in America unapproached as 
a jurist just as Webster stands as an advocate without a 
rival. The former set our constitutional landmarks and 
the latter pointed out where they should be placed. 
And it is significant of W^ebster's primacy that in im- 
portant debates to-day, in Congress or elsewhere, upon 
great questions of a constitutional character or of a 

122 



political-legal character, relating to our systems of Samuel 
government and the nature and limitations of their Walker 
powers, he is more widely quoted than any other law- McCail 
yer, whether speaking only with his own voice or ex 
cathedra as a member of our highest court. 

An important sphere of his professional activity 
would be neglected if I did not refer to his strength as 
an advocate before juries. The same simple style which 
enlightened the courts made him easily understood by 
the ordinary juryman. But his oratory was less fettered 
by technical rules and was more varied before juries 
than before the courts. Only two of his very many 
speeches to juries are preserved in his published works 
and each of these amply demonstrates his enormous 
capacity in that field. I will refer to the speech de- 
livered in the White murder case, because it has been 
pronounced by eminent lawyers, who are accustomed 
to measure their words, to be the greatest argument 
ever addressed to a jury. Certainly it is a masterpiece 
of eloquence. A rich old man had been found in his 
bed murdered. The murderer had been hired by two 
brothers to do the deed in the hope that one of them 
might profit from the old man's estate. "It was," 
said Webster, "a cool, calculating, money-making 
murder," a murder " for hire and salary, not revenge. 
It was the weighing of money against life, the counting 
of so many pieces of silver against so many ounces of 
blood." This is the description of the deed: " The 
assassin enters through the window already prepared, 
into an unoccupied apartment. With noiseless foot he 
paces the lonely hall, half lighted by the moon ; he 
winds up the ascent of the stairs and reaches the door 

123 



Samuel of the chamber. Of this he moves the lock, by soft and 
Walker continuous pressure, till it turns on its hinges without 
McCall noise; and he enters, and beholds his victim before him. 
The room is uncommonly open to the admission of 
light. The face of the innocent sleeper is turned from 
the murderer, and the beams of the moon, resting on 
the grey locks of his aged temple, show him where to 
strike. The fatal blow is given ! and the victim passes, 
without a struggle or a motion, from the repose of sleep 

to the repose of death To finish the 

picture, he explores the wrist for the pulse. He feels 
for it and ascertains that it beats no longer. It is ac- 
complished. The deed is done. He retreats, retraces 
his steps to the window, passes out through it as he 
came in, and escapes. He has done the murder. No 
eye has seen him, no ear has heard him. The secret is 
his own, and it is safe. Ah ! gentlemen, that was a 
dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe nowhere. 
The whole creation of God has neither nook nor corner 
where the guilty can bestow it and say it is safe." And 
then follows the wonderful passage on the power of con- 
science, which is almost as widely known as the pero- 
ration of the reply to Hayne. It is a striking circum- 
stance that the most powerful part of this speech was 
upon a point where the fact was against Webster's po- 
sition, although he may not have been aware of it. 
The fact however was an unnatural one, as facts some- 
times are. The prisoner's counsel had urged that the 
prisoner's motive, in going to a place near the scene of 
the murder at the time it was committed, might have 
been curiosity and not that he might aid the murderer. 
" Curiosity," exclaimed Webster, "to witness the suc- 

J24 



cess of the execution of his own plan of murder ! The Samuel 
very walls of a court house ought not to stand, the "Walker^ 
ploughshare should run through the ground it stands McCall 
on where such an argument could find toleration." 
Rufus Choate, who appears to have heard this speech 
and who was also a fine Greek scholar, declared it to be 
in his opinion ' ' a more difficult and higher effort of 
mind than the Oration on the Crown." 

But prominent as Webster was in the courts, his 
great fame rests upon his career as a political orator and 
a statesman. He was first elected to Congress in 1812 
and from that time until his death, forty years after- 
wards, he was, with the exception of three short inter- 
vals, constantly in the public service. He was for ten 
years a representative in Congress, nineteen years a 
Senator, and five years Secretary of State. He possessed 
no meteoric qualities to startle and attract attention, 
but his commanding talents were certain of recognition 
the moment they were displayed upon a suitable field. 
Within one month from the time he first took his seat 
in the House he made a speech upon the Berlin and 
Milan decrees, which probed deeply into the causes of 
the war we were waging against Great Britain and which 
the duplicity of Napoleon's government had a con- 
siderable share in bringing about. John Marshall, to 
whom Webster was then a stranger, was so deeply im- 
pressed with the speech that he predicted that Webster 
would become "one of the very first statesmen in 
America, if not the very first." During his first Con- 
gress he easily took a place among the very limited 
number of public men of the first rank at Washington, 

125 



Samuel and he grew in strength and the public esteem until he 
Walker had no peer among living American statesmen. 
McCall The chief source of his success as a statesman is 

found in his transcendent power of speech. When his 
public career began, a highly decorated fashion of ora- 
tory, which has been termed the Corinthian style, flour- 
ished in this country. Our orators were justly conscious 
of the fact that we had won our independence from the 
greatest power in the world and had become a nation. 
Everyone was inspired to talk eloquently about liberty 
and as a consequence a vast number of literary crimes 
were committed in her name. It was an excessively 
oratorical era. Whether the thought was great or little 
the grand manner was imperatively demanded. The 
contemporary accounts of the speeches of that time 
were as highly wrought as the speeches themselves and 
one would suppose that orators of the grade of Demos- 
thenes existed in every considerable village ; although 
it will be observed that they gradually diminished in 
number as the cold art of stenography became more 
commonly and successfully practiced. The simple art 
of speaking with reference to the exact truth was held 
in contempt, and the art of extravagant expression was 
carefully cultivated. It is not difficult to detect in this 
extravagance the influence of Edmund Burke. He was 
chiefly responsible, however, only because he stood in a 
class by himself and could defy successful imitation. 
There is nothing more gorgeous in English literature 
than the best of his speeches or essays, for his speeches 
and essays were the same sort of composition. His 
knowledge was varied and prodigious and even his con- 
versation, well compared by Moore to a Roman triumph, 

126 



was enriched with the spoils of all learning. In depth Samuel 
and intensity of feeling and a noble sympathy for the "Walker 
oppressed of every race he was snrpassed by no orator, McCall 
ancient or modern. He had the glowing and exuber- 
ant imagination that 

"Kicks at earth with a disdainful heel 
And beats at Heaven gates with her bright hoofs." 
Imitation of Burke, thus royally endowed and blazing 
with indignation at some great public wrong, would 
easily lend itself to extravagance and produce the empty 
form of colossal speech without its substance. I think 
Burke's influence can be clearly seen in our orators 
from his own day to the end of Charles Sumner's time. 
A few of Webster's speeches show not merely the in- 
spiration due to an appreciative understanding of Burke, 
which was legitimate and might be wholesome, but a 
somewhat close and dispiriting imitation of Burke's man- 
ner. This is true particularly of the much admired 
Plymouth oration, which substituted John Adams for 
the Lord Bathurst of Burke's celebrated passage, and ex- 
torted from that venerable patriot, who had come under 
the spell of the Corinthian era, the statement that Burke 
could no longer be called the most consummate orator 
of modern times. But it is Webster's glory that at his 
best he had a style that was all his own, simple, mas- 
sive and full of grandeur; and compared with some of 
his noble passages Burke's sublimity sometimes seems 
as unsubstantial as banks of cloud by the side of a gran- 
ite mountain. 

While Webster was slow in reaching his full mental 
stature, how rapidly his style developed and simplicity 
took the place of the flowery exaggeration that was then 

127 



Samuel thought to be fine, may be seen by contrasting passages 
"Walker from two of his speeches. In his Fourth of July ad- 
McCall dress delivered at Hanover a year before his graduation 
occurs this passage : "Fair science, too, holds her gentle 
empire among us, and almost innumerable altars are 
raised to her divinity from Brunswick to Florida. Yale, 
Providence and Harvard now grace our land, and Dart- 
mouth, towering majestic above the groves which en- 
circle her, now inscribes her glory on the register of 
fame. Oxford and Cambridge, those Oriental stars of 
literature, shall now be lost, while the bright sun of 
American science displays his broad circumference in 
uneclipsed radiance." The other is from a speech 
early in his Congressional career against the policy of 
forcing the growth of manufactures, or rearing them, 
as he expressed it, "in hotbeds." " I am not anxious 
to accelerate the approach of the period when the great 
mass of American labor shall not find its employment in 
the field ; when the young men of the country shall be 
obliged to shut their eyes upon external nature, upon 
the heavens and the earth, and immerse themselves in 
close and unwholesome workshops ; when they shall be 
obliged to shut their ears to the bleatings of their own 
flocks upon their own hills, and to the voice of the lark 
that cheers them at the plough." The one passage is 
little above or below the style then prevailing among 
schoolboys; the other possesses a simple and lyric beauty 
and might have been written by a master of English 
prose in its golden age. 

In his speech upon the Greek revolution, delivered 
while he was still a member of the House, his style may 
be said to have become fixed in its simplicity. Upon 

128 



such a subject there was every temptation to indulge in Samuel 
passionate declamation about freedom and to make a "Walker 
tremendous display of classical learning, and such a McCall 
treatment seemed to be demanded by the prevailing 
taste of the time ; but the generous sympathy he held 
out to the Greeks, he extended in a speech of severe and 
restrained beauty and the greater part of his effort was 
devoted to a profound study of the principles of the 
Holy Alliance as a conspiracy against popular freedom. 
Jeremiah Mason pronounced this speech the best ex- 
ample of parliamentary eloquence and statesmanlike 
reasoning which our country had seen. The Plymouth 
speech greatly extended his reputation as an orator and 
was most impressive in its immediate effect. George 
Ticknor, who was disposed to be critical, and usually 
admired with difficulty, somewhat hysterically wrote in 
a letter on the day of its delivery : " I warn you before- 
hand that I have not the least confidence in my own 

opinion. His manner carried me away completely 

It seems to me incredible I was never so excited 

by public speaking before in my life. Three or four times 
I thought my temples would burst with the gush of 
blood." This speech was received everywhere with 
the most extravagant praise and may fairly be said to 
have established Webster's position as the first orator of 
the nation. While it contains noble passages it some- 
times expresses the platitude of the day in a style that 
suggests the grandiose, and it shows more strongly than 
any other of his important speeches the literary faults of 
the time. The first Bunker Hill speech and the eulogy 
on Adams and Jefferson are distinctly superior to it. 
That splendid piece of historical fiction, the speech 

129 



Samuel which he puts in the mouth of Adams, is an excellent 
"Walker exhibition of his ability to reproduce the spirit of a great 
McCall event and endow it with life. It was precisely such a 
speech as the most impassioned and strongest advocate 
of the Declaration of Independence might have made on 
the floor of the Continental Congress. If Webster's un- 
derstanding had been less powerful he would have been 
credited with a very great imagination. That faculty, 
however, was strictly subordinated to his reason and in- 
stead of producing anything unusual and fantastic, the 
creature of a disordered rather than a creative imagination, 
he summoned the event out of the past and so invested 
it with its appropriate coloring, and rational and proper 
setting, that it seemed to be a fact rather than a fancy. 
We shall fall far short of doing justice to his power 
as an orator if we fail to take into account his physical 
endowments for speaking. There can be no doubt 
about the majesty of his personal presence. Business 
would be temporarily suspended when he walked down 
State Street, while people rushed to the doors and win- 
dows to see him pass. To the popular imagination he 
seemed to take up half the street. He stood nearly six 
feet, and seemed taller, and he had an enormous meas- 
urement around the chest. His head was one of the 
largest and noblest ever borne upon human shoulders. 
He had a dark complexion, a gunpowder complexion it 
was called, a broad and lofty brow and large black eyes, 
usually full of repose, but in moments of excitement 
blazing with terrible intensity. One of his severest crit- 
ics, Theodore Parker, declared his belief that since 
Charlemagne there had not been such a grand figure in 
all Christendom. 

130 



It might be suspected that the reports were some- Samuel 
what colored by pride in such an American product, but Walker 
he went abroad and his personality produced as deep an McCall 
impression there as at home. vSydney Smith called him 
"a steam engine in trousers" and "a small cathedral all 
by himself." To Carlyle he seemed a "magnificent 
specimen." The historian Hallam wrote of him that 
he approached as nearly the ideal of a Republican Sen- 
ator as any man he had ever seen, one worthy of Rome. 
This enormous personality was not sluggish but in time 
of excitement it was full of animation and dramatic fire. 
Jeremiah Mason said that in him a great actor was lost 
to the stage. He would rise easily to the tragic force 
required in a murder trial and overwhelm the listener 
by his dramatic description of the deed, or he would 
entertain his college friends with a perfect imitation of 
the mannerisms and falsetto tones of President Wheel- 
ock. He possessed as noble a voice as ever broke upon 
the human ear — a voice of great compass, usually high 
and clear, but capable of sinking into deep tones that 
thrilled the listener. He made himself heard by nearly 
fifty thousand people at Bunker Hill. What Mr. Lodge 
says may easily be believed, that no one ever came into 
the world so physically equipped for speech. 

Undoubtedly his oratorical masterpiece is the reply 
to Hayne. When he delivered it he was in his physical 
and intellectual prime. The occasion was the most im- 
portant in our Congressional history. The time had 
come when, if ever, the doctrine of the supremacy of 
the federal constitution should be proclaimed and the 
truth impressed upon the minds and hearts of the peo- 
ple that the United States was not a confederacy, loosely 

131 



Samuel knit tog^ether and continuing in existence only at the 
Walker pleasure of each one of the sovereign states which com- 
McCall posed it, but that it was a nation, and that its laws, en- 
acted in conformity with the constitution, as declared 
by the Supreme Court, were the supreme law of the 
land. This great argument over the meaning of the 
constitution had begun almost on the day when it was 
put in operation. The states-rights school of interpre- 
tation found much to support it in the construction put 
upon the constitution by those who had borne an impor- 
tant part in framing it. It had been steadily growing 
and its doctrines had reached their full development. 
The term "sovereign state" was a verv attractive one to 
the popular mind and demanded a proper limitation up- 
on its meaning. Hayne, too, spoke for a state which 
was about to attempt to put his theory into practical 
force. That theory had never received so captivating 
a presentation as he gave it. The work of formulating 
the creed of union so that it might become a popular 
force and not merely check the further advance of the 
doctrines of nullification, but put them on the defensive 
and turn them upon a retreat, naturally fell to Webster. 
Calhoun, with his great industry, his high personal 
character and his enormous power of logic was the lead- 
ing advocate of states-rights. Clay did not at that time 
happen to be a member of the Senate. But Clay, who 
was a great party leader, a masterful debater and an im- 
passioned orator, did not possess the legal training and 
the grasp upon principles which the occasion demanded, 
and orator as he was, he did not possess the choice gift 
of uttering the literature of genuine eloquence, of speak- 
ing the words that should wing their flight to the fiire- 

132 



side of the farmer and artisan and to the study of the Samuel 
scholar, and set their hearts on fire for the Union. The Walker 
one man for the work was the man to whom it fell. McCall 

With much that was strong and brilliant in 
Hayne's speech, there was a great deal that was paltry 
and personal and had no place in a great constitutional 
argument. There was an ingenious attempt to set one 
section of the Union against the other. New England 
was held up to ridicule. Hayne imitated Homer's he- 
roes who began their fights with taunts and boasts. A ^ 
personal attack was made upon Webster and he was 
taunted with fearing that Benton might be an overmatch 
for him in debate. I am not sure that this did not 
greatly add to the interest of the reply. It introduced 
the personal, human element, and served to call Web- 
ster's great combative powers fully into play. One can 
imaeiue this Titan with his whole nature aroused, thor- 
oughly informed upon his great subject, profoundly im- 
pressed with the justice of his cause, but unhampered by 
any written speech, rising in the Senate and for nearly 
seven hours pouring forth that mighty torrent of argu- 
ment, fact, irony and eloquence found in the reply. To 
say that the speech fully met the occasion is to give it 
the highest possible praise. The advantage was with 
Webster upon every point. When he took his seat he 
had triumphantly vindicated New England, he had 
crushed his antagonist in the personal controversy, al- 
though with a majestic scorn he had barely stooped to 
engage in it, and, far more important than anything 
else, he had reduced the doctrine of nullification to an 
absurdity, by demonstrating that its application would 
mean the disruption of the central government, would 

133 



Samuel make the Union a mere " rope of sand " and organize 
Walker governmental chaos into a system. In that portion of 
Mcdll his speech he did as much to create as to expound the 
constitution, and he held up to the country the image of 
a government limited, indeed, in its powers, but in its 
sphere perfect, and beyond the control of the state gov- 
ernment. Among the manv ties that bind men to- 
gether there is no stronger tie than the spirit of nation- 
ality. It was to that spirit that he so fervently appealed 
in that splendid piece of rhetoric in the printed perora- 
tion of the speech, a peroration not indeed spoken in all 
its important parts to the few scores of people in the 
Senate chamber, but spoken to the millions of his coun- 
trymen outside of it. 

It was this speech more than any other single event 
. ' from the adoption of the Constitution to the Civil War, 
which compacted the states into a nation. There were 
apparently few people in the country able to read and to 
follow public affairs who did not read the more impor- 
tant portions of it. The leading newspapers published 
it in full. Vast numbers of copies were sent out in the 
form of pamphlets. It was declaimed by schoolboys in 
every schoolhouse. It gave the nation a definite im- 
pulse towards nationality and it laid down the battle 
line for those great armies which fought and triumphed 
iiLthe cause of the Union. 

i- The speech in itself is worthy of the enormous part 
it has played in history. It was unstudied and sponta- 
neous and it displayed in a sublime degree that fusion of 
reason and passion which Macaulay pronounces neces- 
sary to true eloquence. It is energetic, direct, simple, 
and it has that rapidity of movement which is the first 

134 



test of intellectual vigor. It probably received less re- Samuel 
vision than speeches at that time usually received and I "Walker 
believe that no great speech of similar length which oc- McCall 
cupies a place near it in literature was ever the object of 
less verbal polishing before and after delivery. It was 
extemporaneous, and if we bear in mind that the art of 
shorthand writing was at that time by no means per- 
fectly developed, the stenographer's report shows that 
the form was not greatly changed except in a few pas- 
sages. The printed peroration has been pronounced by 
good judges, and I think rightly, artificial. It is hard- 
ly conceivable that after speaking more than six hours 
his extemporaneous speech should have taken that fin- 
ished and balanced form. That there was little of the 
artificial in the spoken peroration is made evident from 
the shorthand report: 

"While the nation lasts, we have a great prospect 
of prosperity; and, when this Union breaks up, there is 
nothing in prospect for us to look at, but what I regard 
with horror and despair. God forbid ; yes sir, God for- 
bid, that I should live to see this cord broken ; to be- 
hold the state of things which carries us back to dis- 
union, calamity and civil war ! When my eyes shall 
be turned for the last time on the meridian sun, I hope 
I may see him shining bright, upon my united, free and 
happy country. I hope I shall not live to see his beams 
falling upon the dispersed fragments of the structure of 
this once glorious Union. I hope I may not see the flag 
of my country, with its stars separated or obliterated, 
torn by commotion, smoking with the blood of civil 
war. I hope I may not see the standard raised of sep- 
arate state rights, star against star and stripe against 

t35 



Samuel stripe; but that the flag of the Union may keep its stars 
"Walker and its stripes corded and bound together in indissoluble 
McCall ties. I hope I shall not see written, as its motto, First 
Liberty, and then Union. I hope I shall see no such de- 
lusive and deluded motto on the flag of that country. I 
hope to see spread all over it, blazoned in letters of light, 
and proudly floating over land and sea, that other senti- 
ment, dear to my heart, ' Union and Liberty, now and 
forever, one and inseparable.' " 

As a piece of composition the printed form is doubt- 
less the better one, but as the conclusion of a great speech 
in which a powerful mind under great excitement sought 
at the moment its appropriate form of expression it 
seems to me the spoken peroration is to be preferred. 
Instead of moving along upon symmetrical lines, beauti- 
ful and majestic, throwing the spray evenly upon either 
side, like a painted ship upon a painted ocean, we see 
him rather like a mighty battleship plunging madly 
through the waves, dashing the spray above its turrets, 
with engines throbbing irregularly and hard, the incar- 
nation of terrible power mastering the power of the sea. 
While the reply to Hayne shows Webster on the 
whole at his best, some of his great qualities were more 
conspicuously displayed in other speeches. In the de- 
bate with Calhoun three years afterwards, he made an 
argument against nullification which was more complete 
and elaborately wrought out, and which dealt that doc- 
trine a finishing blow so far as any constitutional basis 
was concerned. But it was severely argumentative and 
did not have the popular qualities of his first great 
Union speech. His 7th of March speech, famous for 
other reasons than its rhetoric, is conversational in tone, 

136 



rising naturally to the heights of eloquence, and in its 
speaking style it appears to me to be the equal of the 
best of his speeches. It lacked any degree of the hard 
rhetorical form at that time deemed necessary to good 
oratory, and which imparted to much of it, compared 
with the more direct modern method, the appearance of 
an unknown tongue. The speech on the presidential 
protest is more studied than the reply to Hayne, and in 
it his imagination mounts on an easy wing in the cele- 
brated passage on the military greatness of England. If 
any of the orators of that nation has ever given a nobler 
picture of her power I do not know where it can be 
found : " On this question of principle, while actual suf- 
fering was yet afar off, they raised their flag against a 
power, to which, for purposes of foreign conquest and 
subjugation, Rome, in the height of her glory, is not to 
be compared; a power which has dotted over the surface 
of the whole globe with her possessions and military 
posts, whose morning drum-beat, following the sun and 
keeping company with the hours, circles the earth with 
one continuous and unbroken strain of the martial airs 
of England." 

What is the relative position of Webster among the 
great orators of the world ? All would not agree upon 
his exact place, although all would doubtless place him 
very high among them. The two great orators of an- 
cient times must, I think, be left out of the account. 
There is little more common ground for a comparison 
between Webster and Demosthenes than there would be 
for a comparison between a speech of Webster and a 
book of Homer. What common standard can be set up 
between the Greek who spoke to a fickle and marvel- 

137 



Samuel 
Walker 
McCall 



Samuel ously ingenious people, whose verdict when he obtained 
Walker it would often only be written on water, and Web- 
McCallster, speaking in a different tongue, to an altogether dif- 
ferent people, and shaping in their minds the principles 
of practical government to endure for generations? 
How many English-speaking people know enough 
Greek to understand a speech of Demosthenes as they 
would one spoken in their own language ? Those who 
do not cannot form an exact judgment, and the few, if 
any, who do, are prone to find virtues in particles and, 
like Shakspeare's critics, to bring to view in the text 
things of which the orator was abjectly ignorant. Too 
much has been swept away in the twenty centuries since 
Cicero and Demosthenes spoke, and it is easy to praise 
those orators too little or too much. Separated from us 
by the barriers of distance, of language and of race, the 
most that can safely be ventured is that in literary form 
they probably surpassed any of the moderns. 

The orators with whom Webster can most profita- 
bly be compared are those who employed the same lan- 
guage and spoke to the same race. Surely it is not a 
narrow field. It is a race that has employed the art of 
government by speaking for centuries, and has far out- 
stripped any other people of ancient or modern times in 
the development of the parliamentary system. The re- 
sult of that system has been to produce oratory which 
is not simply literature nor merely spectacular, but 
which at its best is especially adapted to the practical 
purpose of influencing the judgment of those who listen 
upon some momentous public question. Where, as is 
the case among the English-speaking peoples, the fate 
of a government or an administration often turns upon 

138 



the result of a single debate, where again the verdict of 
the parliamentary body is liable to be set aside by the 
people who are the sources of political power and before 
whom the discussion must be ultimately carried, there 
is a field for the development of oratory such as has 
never existed in any other race. Among the orators of 
his own country there may be individuals who in some 
particulars surpass him. Everett carried the elaborate 
oratory at that time in vogue to a greater perfection of 
finish and form. Webster does not show the surprises 
and felicities to be found in the style of Choate, who is 
as rapid, pure and winding as a mountain stream, and 
who in brilliancy of imagination easily outranks all 
other American orators. The only Englishmen who 
stand in a class with Webster are Fox and Burke. In 
comparing him with them it must be borne in mind 
that his most important speeches were made in constru- 
ing the terms of a written constitution which, however 
beneficial it may be to individual liberty, is not a nurse 
of political eloquence. It imposes rigid artificial limits, 
and, to the extent that it requires statesmen to be the 
expounders of written political scriptures rather than of 
broad natural principles, it hampers the freedom of the 
mind. 

Rogers said that he never heard anything equal to 
Fox's speeches in reply, and Burke with generous en- 
thusiasm called him the most brilliant debater the world 
ever saw. That was Webster's great quality. He was 
pre-eminently a debater. He did not have Fox's celerity, 
but he possessed far greater weight. Fox would lay 
down a proposition and repeat it again and again. He 
was often stormy in manner and would sometimes niag- 

139 



Samuel 
Walker 
McCall 



Samuel nify trifles. His vehemence was so great that one 
Walker occasionally suspects him of diverting attention from 
■'^''^^" the weakness of an argument. But he had no affec- 
tations. He was animated by noble ideas of political 
freedom which comprehended not merely his own race 
or neighborhood, but embraced the peoples of distant 
lands; and regardless of literary form he would press 
those ideas home and strike by the most direct lines at 
the judgment of the listener. There was little quick- 
ness or mere dexterity about Webster, but it seemed im- 
possible to impose upon his understanding, and his 
great guns would open upon the weak points of his ad- 
versary, however artfully covered up. No man could 
excel him in the power to destroy utterly the sham 
structures of sophistry. He would never set up a man 
of straw, but would resolutely grapple with his oppo- 
nent's argument in its full force. His vigilance was 
extraordinary, and when surprised, as he sometimes was 
in running debate, it is not difficult to detect in his 
tone the martial note, as he rushes upon and captures 
the threatening position by a display of force simply 
portentous. It is not easy to compare Webster and 
Fox in the immediate effect produced by their speeches, 
but there can be no doubt that the personality of the 
former was more impressive; and if we are to trust at all 
to the contemporary accounts it is entirely safe to say 
that Fox never surpassed, if indeed he ever equalled, 
the tremendous effect produced by Webster in his great- 
est efforts. Between the speeches of the two men there 
can be no comparison in point of substance and literary 
form. Fox's speeches certainly contain one character- 
istic that he claimed was essential to good speeches, 

140 



they do not read well. It is not difTiciilt to see in the Samuel 
best of tliem the evidence of his brilliant talents, but Walker 
they do not strongl\- impress one with weight of matter ^cC^'' 
or with the literary quality. In the half dozen large 
volumes of Webster's speeches which have been col- 
lected together there is doubtless a great deal that is 
prosy. An orator wdio speaks often and ahvays makes 
an eloquent speech is usually one who will never make 
a great one. Only on exceptional occasions was Web- 
ster thoroughly aroused. But those volnmes contain a 
mine of information and of reason for political students; 
they contain nnich literature of the first rank and 1 
doubt if in all of them a sentence can be found that is 
flippant or petty or mean. 

I have already spoken of Burke. He is, I think, 
superior to Webster as a political philosopher, and also 
in breadth of information and imaginatixe power, but 
in the excellence of the great mass of oratorical work 
which he left behind him he does not much surpass 
Webster, if at all. He presents more gorgeous pas- 
sages, but even his most glittering fabrics do not imply 
the intellectual strength shown in the simple solidity of 
Webster. But if it be admitted that he precedes Web- 
ster in the permanent value of his speeches, in their tem- 
porary effect I do not think he can be classed with him. 
He often shot over the heads of his audience, and some 
of his greatest speeches emptied the House of Commons. 
It was said of him that he always seemed to be in a 
passion. Webster never permitted himself to be in a 
frenzy, fine or otherwise. On the whole I think it safe 
to say that Webster is not surpassed by Burke, and if 



I4J 



Samuel he is equalled by any other English-speaking orator he 

Walker is equalled by Burke alone. 

McCall But whether or not "Webster was the greatest of all 

men in power of speech, he deserves a place among the 
half dozen greatest orators of the world. To take rank 
in that chosen circle is indeed glory. For the tran- 
scendently great orator, who has kindled his own time 
and nation to action and who also speaks to foreign 
nations and distant ages, must divide with great poets the 
affectionate homage of mankind. While the stirring 
history of the Greek people and its noble literature shall 
continue to have charm and interest for men, the won- 
derfully chiselled periods of Demosthenes and the sim- 
ple yet lofty speech of Pericles will be no less immortal 
than the odes of Pindar or the tragedies of Sophocles or 
Aeschylus. The light that glows upon the pages of 
Virgil shines with no brighter radiance than is seen in 
those glorious speeches with which Cicero moved that 
imperial race that dominated the world. The glowing 
oratory of Edmund Burke will live until sensibility to 
beauty and the generous love of liberty shall die. And 
I believe the words of Webster, nobly voicing the possi- 
bilities of a mighty nation as yet only dimly conscious 
of its destiny, will continue to roll upon the ears of men 
■while the nation he helped to fashion shall endure, or 
indeed while government founded upon popular free- 
dom shall remain an instrument of civilization. 

It is sometimes said of Webster that as a statesman 
he was not creative and that no great legislative acts 
are identified with his name; that he was the unrivalled 
advocate of policies but not their originator. It must 
be remembered that during most of his Congressional 

142 



career his party was in a minority and he had only a Samuel 
limited opportunity to fashion political legislation. He "Walker 
did not, it is true, pass any considerable portion of his McCall 
time in drawing bills, embodying more or less fanciful 
theories of government. But he displayed in a promi- 
nent degree the qualities of statesmanship most loudly 
called for by his time. He was highly successful in 
adapting to the needs of a nation the provisions of a 
written constitution, by applying to its construction the 
soundest principles of government. It was beyond 
human foresight for the framers of the Constitution to 
comprehend the unknown demands of the future. The 
application of that frame of government to new needs 
and conditions demanded as high and as original an 
order of statesmanship as was required in the first in- 
stance to write it. It might easily have supported a 
greatly different structure of government if it had been 
less wisely expounded. If our highest court has been 
able to recognize supposed national exigencies and ap- 
ply contradictory judicial constructions to the same 
clause of the Constitution, we can easily see that it 
might indeed be a flexible instrument in the hands of 
statesmen whose prime function is political and not 
judicial. But there was no paltry expediency in Web- 
ster's expounding. His recognition of sound princi- 
ples, his profound sympathy with the genius of our sys- 
tem, and his true political sense enabled him to display 
the most difficult art of statesmanship, the practical ap- 
plication of theory to the government of a nation. The 
principles of government are derived from a long series 
of experiments, and the statesman who produces some- 
thing novel produces something which experience will 

t43 



Samuel usually show it is well to avoid. Originality of states- 
Walker tnanship does not alone consist in bring-ing: forth some- 
""^^ thing unheard of in government, or in keeping on hand, 
as Sieyes was said to have done, a large assortment of 
constitutions readv made. Neither can I see orig-inali- 
ty or even a high order of statesmanship in patching up 
a truce by some temporary device, which, after it shall 
have lost its effect, will leave the body politic in a worse 
condition than when it found it. Webster aided in 
making the Constitution work among conditions that 
its founders did not foresee. He contributed to protect 
it from danger, against which they made no provisions 
and to endow it with perpetuity. His adherence to 
sound principles was as resolute as his recognition of 
them was instinctive. He would not be swerved from 
them by considerations of temporary expediency. This 
unbending quality and an indisposition to appeal to a 
pseudo-patriotism prevented him in the conditions then 
existing from becoming a great party leader, and in that 
respect he strikingly resembled Fox. After a career un- 
exampled among statesmen, in its constant treatment 
of liberty as a birthright of all men and not as a peculiar 
prerogative of Englishmen, it was said of Fox's follow- 
ing in Parliament that they could all be put in a hack- 
ney coach. The reason is obvious. The British Par- 
liament has usually been jealous for British freedom, 
but when British demands come in conflict with the 
freedom of foreign peoples, liberty then becomes a much 
less influential sentiment than what on such occasions 
is sometimes termed humanity and sometimes civiliza- 
tion. 

Let us follow Webster's course upon some of the 

144 



more important issues of his time in order to gain a Samuel 
practical insight into his statesmanship. He was a Walker 
friend of commerce, which, he declared, had paid the McCall 
price of independence, and he was in favor of encourag- 
ing it both with foreign nations and between the states 
themselves. He was, therefore, strenuously opposed to 
the embargo which preceded and attended the war with 
Great Britain. He was so hostile to the war itself 
that he refused to vote supplies to carry it on. Even 
that much quoted passage, so frequently employed 
against those who would question proposed aggressions 
upon other peoples, "our party divisions, acrimonious 
as they are, cease at the water's edge" was uttered by 
him in a speech against a bill to encourage enlist- 
ment. He was opposed to the war because he thought 
it inexpedient and wrong. The question of peace or 
war he declared was "not to be compressed into the 
compass that would fit a small litigation." It was a 
great question of right and expediency. " Considera- 
tions which go back to the origin of our institutions and 
other considerations which look forward to our hopeful 
progress in future times, all belong, in their just pro- 
portions and graduations, to a question in the determi- 
nation of which the happiness of the present and of fu- 
ture generations may be so much concerned. Utterly 
astonished at the declaration of war, I have been sur- 
prised at nothing since. Unless all history deceived 
me, I saw how it would be prosecuted when I saw how 
it was begun. There is in the nature of things an un- 
changeable relation between rash counsels and feeble 
execution." The struggle itself, whether just or unjust 
at its inception, became almost a war of self-preserva- 

145 



Samuel tion, and Webster's attitude was an extreme one in re- 
Walker fusing to vote the necessary means to carry it on. At a 
McCall much later period of his life he voted for supplies for 
the war with Mexico, to which he had also been op- 
posed. But his position was unassailable when during 
the war of 1S12 he declined to be badgered out of the 
right of public discussion, for he did not escape the fury 
of the small patriots of his time. " It is," he said, " a 

home-bred right, a fireside privilege It is not 

to be drawn in controversy Belonging to pri- 
vate life as a right, it belongs to public life as a duty. 
This high constitutional privilege I shall de- 
fend and exercise wdthin this House and without this 
House, and in all places, in time of peace, in time of 



war." 



His earlier speeches in Congress on the tariff were 
upon free trade lines and against the exercise of the 
taxing power of the- Constitution for the purpose of pro- 
tection. During his term of service in the House he 
voted against tariff bills that were protective in their na- 
ture, but after he became a member of the Senate he 
voted for such bills, and he has often been accused of 
inconsistency on account of these apparently contra- 
dictory votes. But his answer was simple and appar- 
ently conclusive. He had opposed the policy of arti- 
ficially calling manufactures into being, but it had been 
adopted. New England had acquiesced in a system 
which had been forced upon her against the votes of her 
representatives. Manufactures had been built up and 
he would not vote to strike them down. 

During the early years of his service in the House 
he began his advocacy of a sound money system and he 

146 



continued to support it, while the currency was an Samuel 
issue, to the end of his career. The delusive arguments Walker 
in favor of a money which the art of printing made McCall 
cheap of production did not impose upon him. No man 
of his time set forth more clearly the principles of a 
sound svstem of finance or the disaster which would fol- 
low a deviation from it. He had been so conspicuous 
in the debates upon financial measures that President 
Harrison requested him to accept the Secretaryship of 
the Treasury at the time he became Secretary of State. 

He was too firm a friend of civil justice not to make 
an indignant protest against the bill proposing to take 
the trial of certain cases of treason from the courts and 
give them to military tribunals. 

The Force bill of 1833, which gave Jackson the au- 
thority to cope with the nullification movement in South 
Carolina, would probably have failed of passage without 
Webster's support. That measure, however, became of 
little consequence after the substantial concession to 
that state made in the tariff propositions brought for- 
ward by INIr. Clay, who was usually ready to apply tem- 
porary devices to any threateuing situation. Webster 
austerely declined to surrender to the threats of South 
Carolina and voted against the tariff bill. 

He jealously upheld the prerogatives of the Senate 
and resolutely severed the growing friendship between 
himself and Jackson, when the latter showed a dispo- 
sition towards personal government and an autocratic 
administration of the laws. But first of all he was at- 
tached to the principles of popular government, and 
while a Senator he favored a broad construction of the 
power which the Constitution gave to the representa- 

147 



Samuel tives to originate revenue bills. In a running debate in 
"Walker the Senate he took the position that territories were not 
McCall a part of the United States, within the meaning of the 
Constitution, and he referred for authority to a class of 
decisions of the Supreme Court. It so happened that 
the court had decided but a single case of the class he 
mentioned, and that he himself had been of counsel. It 
showed his remarkable memory and command of his re- 
sources that thirty years afterwards he was able, appar- 
ently upon the spur of the moment, to urge in all its 
force the argument he had prepared in the law case. 
The court, however, although it had decided the case in 
his favor, had not put its decision upon the ground he 
urged. In the same debate in the Senate he made it 
clear, whatever he may have meant in claiming that the 
Constitution did not extend to the territories, that the 
oath of members of Congress bound them to observe its 
limitations even when legislating for the territories, 
which is an essential point in the great controversy in 
which he has recently been so often cited as an author- 
itv. So far from admitting that a denial of Consrression- 
al absolutism in dealing with human rights anywhere 
would make our government an incomplete or crippled 
government, he saw in tendencies of an opposite char- 
acter the danger that our constitution would be con- 
verted " into a deformed monster," into a great " frame 
of unequal government" and "into a curse rather than 
a blessing." He also gave weighty expression to the 
opinion that while arbitrary governments could govern 
distant possessions by different laws and different sys- 
tems we could do no such thing. He protested against 
the policy of admitting new and small states into the 

HZ 



Union, becanse of its tendency to destroy the balance Samuel 
established by the Constitution and convert the Senate Walker 
into an oligarchy, a policy which has been pursued un- McCall 
til at last states having less than a sixth of the popula- 
tion of the country elect a majority of the entire Senate. 
He took a leading part in the codification of the crimi- 
nal laws of the nation and in the enlargement of its ju- 
dicial system. He profoundly deplored the existence of 
slavery and many striking utterances against it may be 
found in his speeches, but he held to the opinion, which, 
indeed, appears to have prevailed everywhere at that 
time, that the national government had no authority 
under the Constitution to interfere with slavery in the 
states where it was established. He believed that the 
non-political offices of the government should not be 
used as party spoils, and a generation before civil service 
reform made its appearance on this continent he gave 
luminous expression to its most essential principles. 
His public career was singularly free from demagoguery 
and his speeches will be explored in vain for catch- 
penny appeals to the passing popular fancy. One of the 
great achievements of his career, as well as one of the 
most definite and honorable triumphs of American 
diplomacy, is found in the negotiation of the Webster- 
Ashburton treaty. The dispute over the Northeastern 
boundary had for years been a source of irritation be- 
tween this country and Great Britain and had baffled 
such earnest attempts at solution that it promised to 
continue a menace to the peace of the two nations. It 
had defied the good offices of arbitration. It was 
complicated with domestic difficulties and the American 
negotiations had been hampered by the rights of one of 

149 



Samuel the states of the Union. The British government had 
Walker finally dispatched a large number of soldiers to Canada, 
McCail and our minister at London expressed the opinion that 
war appeared inevitable. There were also other annoy- 
ing sources of dispute aside from that relating to the 
boundary. Webster triumphantly overcame all obsta- 
cles, and he could proudly appeal, as he subsequently 
did in the Senate, "to the public men of the age 
whether, in 1842. and in the city of Washington, some- 
thing was not done for the suppression of crime, for the 
true exposition of the principles of public law, for the 
freedom and security of commerce on the ocean, and 
for the peace of the world." The qualities which he 
displayed in these negotiations attracted attention in the 
British Parliament. Macaulay commented on his "firm, 
resolute, vigilant and unyielding" manner. Diplomatic 
writing has a peculiar rhetoric, a rhetoric which Webster 
had the good sense to refuse to adopt in preference to 
his own. Compared with his condensed and weighty 
letter upon impressment, for instance, the ordinary- 
fawning or threatening diplomatic performance seems a 
flimsy .structure indeed. The claim, on the part of the 
British government, of the right to impress British-born 
sailors from the decks of American ships could not 
survive the conclusive arguments which he crowded 
into the brief letter to Ashburton, and which without 
any pretense led to the conclusion that "the American 
government then is prepared to say that the practice of 
impressing seamen from American vessels cannot be 
hereafter allowed to take place." And then he ran up 
the flag, not for rhetorical purpo.ses, but over the solid 
foundation of reason, from which it can never be hauled 

150 



down without overturning established principles : "In Samuel 
every regularly documented American vessel the crew Walker 
who navigate it will find their protection in the flag McCall 
that is over them." No one could mistake the mean- 
ing of what was so simply stated after its justice had 
been so conclusively shown. It is impossible for an 
American to read the diplomatic correspondence of 
Webster while Secretary of State and not feel a new 
pride in his country. The absolute absence of anything 
petty or meretricious, the simple dignity and the 
sublime and conscious power cause one to feel that it 
ennobled the nation to have such a defender. It may 
be said, too, that the manner in which he conducted 
the State department proved that he possessed the 
highest qualities of executive statesmanship. 

But the overshadowing work of his public life is to 
be found in the part he performed in maintaining the 
supremacy of the laws of the national government en- 
acted in conformity with the Constitution. In the great 
controversy over the relations between the central and 
state governments, which began soon after the adoption 
of the Constitution and continued until it was removed 
from the forum of debate to be settled by the arbitra- 
ment of arms, Webster was the colossal figure. From 
the high ground he took in the reply to Hayne he 
never wavered. If he erred at all in his devotion to the 
national idea, it was in the sacrifices he was willing to 
make for it. Twenty years after his first great discus- 
sion upon the Union, he made a speech on that subject 
which excited fiercer controversy than has ever been 
kindled by any other utterance of an American states- 
man. I refer to the speech which, whatever it might 

15\ 



Samuel be appropriately called from its theme, will probably 
Walker always retain the name of the Seventh of ISIarch Speech. 
McCali It gave rise to more criticism, to employ no harsher 
term, than grew out of all the rest of his public career. 
■ The alienation, which it occasioned, from many of his 
former friends, who were grieved to the heart and re- 
garded him after the seventh of March as a fallen arch- 
angel, the relentless abuse it drew forth from others 
who had never been his friends, embittered the last days 
of his life. A half century' after it was spoken we should 
be able to hear something of those permanent voices 
which are drowned in the fleeting tumult of the times, 
but which speak to after ages. I do not agree that 
that speech must be passed by in silence out of regard 
for Webster's fame. Twenty years ago the poet Whit- 
tier made noble reparation for "Ichabod "in the "Lost 
Occasion," and even more ample reparation would be 
his due if in judging him one applied the same tests 
that are apparently applied to his critics. 

When he replied to Hayne, the danger to the 
Union was chiefly theoretical, except for the attitude of 
a single state, but on the seventh of IMarch the contro- 
versy had become more angry and practical. Only a few 
weeks before he spoke, an anti-slavery society, most 
respectable in numbers and the character of its members, 
had met in his own state, and in Faneuil Hall, and had 
resolved that they were the enemies of the Constitution 
and Union and proclaimed their purpose to " live and 
labor for a dissolution of the present Union." These 
resolutions were but the echo of what had come from 
a similar society in the state of Ohio. They emanated 
not from the home of nullification doctrines, but from 

152 



that portion of the country where the hopes of the Union Samuel 
lay. There was an equally uncompromising and a more Walker 
resentful feeling upon the other side of the slavery ques- McCall 
tions, and a convention had been called at the city of 
Nashville to give it voice. That convention subsequently 
put forth an address in favor of disunion. The an- 
nexation of Texas, the war with Mexico and the treaty 
of peace had produced practical and pressing questions, 
and Webster had come reluctantly to believe that their 
solution, without detriment to the Union, was most dif- 
ficult in the inflamed condition of the public mind. 
More than a year after he made the speech he declared 
that " in a very alarming crisis " he felt it his "duty to 
come out. ' ' " If , " he said at that time, ' ' I had seen the 
stake, if I had heard the fagots already crackling, by 
the blessing of Almighty God, I would have gone on 
and discharged the duty which I thought my country 
called upon me to perform." 

That a similar opinion of the importance of the 
crisis was entertained by those two great men whose 
names stand perhaps next to his own and forever to be 
associated with it in our Congressional annals, there 
can be no doubt. There is something pathetic in the 
spectacle of those three statesmen, then almost at the 
end of their careers, who had often radically differed 
with each other upon public questions, bending their 
energies to the support of a common cause and strug- 
gling to avert a common danger. Clay put forth a last 
effort of his statesmanship and brought forward his com- 
promise measure. For the moment he forgot his dif- 
ferences with Webster and earnestly besought the latter 
for his support. Calhoun, too weak to utter his own 

J 53 



Samuel words, spoke through the mouth of another, in his last 
"Walker speech in the Senate, his sense of the gravity of the 
McCall crisis. It was said, and has been so often repeated that 
it is accepted in some quarters as an article of political 
faith, that Webster made his speech as a bid for the 
Presidency. The imputation of an unworthy motive to 
a public man is easy to make and difficult to disprove. 
But on this point it is pertinent to remember that he 
threw away his fairest chance for the Presidency by 
patriotically refusing, at the dictates of his own party 
in his own state and of its leaders in the country, tore- 
tire from Tyler's cabinet until our differences with Great 
Britain should be composed ; that he had many times 
resigned or refused to accept important public office ; 
that the great position of Senator from Massachusetts 
had more than once to be forced upon him, and that, 
before the 7th of March at least, he had fully lived up 
to his own impressive declaration that solicitations for 
high public office were " inconsistent with personal dig- 
nity and derogatory to the character of the institutions 
of the country." Solicitude for the Union was no new 
thing with him, that an ignoble motive should be as- 
cribed. But it w^as not the first time, or probably wall 
not be the last, when those having in view the accom- 
plishment of some great public object to the exclusion 
of everything else, have imputed evil motives tothose wdio 
have not sanctioned their particular course of procedure, 
especially when they threatened to pull down the pillars 
of the state itself, if thereby the evil might be destroyed 
in the common calamity. Reform drawls to itself not 
only the single-minded who have no sordid aims, but it 
is attractive also to those censorious spirits who delight 

154 



not so iinicli in battering down the ramparts of wrong Samuel 
as in abusing those hapless individuals who will not walker 
agree that evil methods are to be sanctified by noble McCall 
ends. In the speeches of some of the leaders of the anti- 
slavery movement, denunciation of slavery had the 
second place and denunciation of Webster the first, and 
when the time of consummation came, even Lincoln did 
not escape their acrimony. 

The high moral purpose and the great practical value 
of the abolition movement cannot be questioned. But it 
also cannot be questioned that a good deal of the agita- 
tion was disruptive, and, in the conditions then existing, 
tended less towards freedom than to disunion and war. 
They might have broken the"compact with hell" which 
was the favorite term of some of them for the Constitution 
of their country, but it is not easy to see how this pro- 
gramme could have broken a single chain, with a free 
and a slave republic side by side and hostile to each 
other. In the light of to-day it can be clearly seen that 
to accomplish freedom the concurrence of other forces 
was demanded. The truth will often ultimately spring 
from apparently contradictory forces. Agitation was 
necessary to educate and arouse the people, but it needed 
also to be checked before it should become swollen 
beyond constitutional limits and form the basis of a 
revolution, for with any important body of opinion at 
the North co-operating with disunion at the South, the 
nation would have been rent asunder. 

But look a little more closely at the matter. I pre- 
sume no one wouldnowcriticisethe willingness of Web- 
ster, as the great advocate of constitutional supremacy, 
to accord to the South whatever it had a right, accord- 

155 



Samuel ing to the terms of the Constitution, to demand. The 
Walker specific thing in the speech criticised, with the nearest 
McCall approach to justice, was the position with regard to New 
Mexico. He declared that natural kiw had effectively 
banished slavery from that territory, because of its sterile 
and mountainous character, and that he would not vote 
uselessly to re-enact the will of God and banish slavery 
by a statute. He therefore accepted that feature of 
Clay's compromise with the declaration that he would 
favor the application of the so-called Wilmot proviso to 
any territory in which there was any danger that slavery 
might be established. This was certainly a technical if 
not a practical concession to the Southern demands. 
For accepting this policy with regard to New Mexico, 
he was accused by Mr. Seward, who undoubtedly spoke 
the sentiments of the Free Soil leaders, with having 
"derided the proviso of freedom, the principle of the 
ordinance of 1787." Ten years later, when it did not 
require a statesman's eye to see the danger, nor a states- 
man's ear to hear the thunders of the approaching storm. 
Congress consented to apply the very principle which 
Webster was willing to concede to New Mexico, to the 
whole of that vast domain out of which the Dakotas and 
Nevada and Colorado have since been car\-ed, and neither 
Seward nor Adams nor Sumner, nor any other member 
of Congress belonging to the great new anti-slavery 
party, was heard to raise his voice or vote against it. 
These men were his critics. Surely, if Webster was a 
traitor to the cause of freedom, they must keep him com- 
pany. If he was a traitor, their guilt was deeper than 
his, for they were the special guardians of freedom 
while he was only the champion of the Union ; and the 

156 



scornful repeal by the South of the settlement of 1850 Samuel 
shed a brighter light for them than was given to him, Walker 
upon the futility of all compromise. The truth is, none McCall 
of them was a traitor. They were true-hearted, patri- 
otic men, solicitous for the preservation of the Republic 
which they loved. But when the most responsible of 
Webster's accusers saw the danger, as he saw it, they 
were willing to make concessions to slaverv far more 
hateful than any of which he had ever dreamed. 

In the great conflict of arms in which the debate 
finally culminated, it was the sentiment of Union that 
banded those invincible armies together, and it w^as 
only through the triumph of that sentiment that we en- 
joyed the blessings of a restored government and that the 
slave secured his freedom. And had that great states- 
man on the 7th of March shown any less anxiety for the 
Union, had that great centripetal force become centrifu- 
gal or weakened in the attraction which it exerted to 
hold the states in their orbits, who shall say that our 
magnificent and now united domain might not be covered 
by two hostile flags, one of which would float over a re- 
public founded upon slavery ! 

And then there is that ill-omened thing which, 
wherever else it may be found, is sure to attend great- 
ness. The baleful goddess of Detraction sits ever at the 
elbow of Fame unsweetening what is written upon the 
record. Whether it springs from the envy of rivals or 
from the tendency in human nature to identify the ma- 
terial of greatness with common clay, it is true, as Burke 
says, that obloquy is an essential ingredient in the com- 
position of all true glory. This proof of greatness, such 
as it is, exists in ample measure in the history of Web- 

157 



Samuel ster. No man since Washington has had more of it. 
Walker ^]^q pity of it all is that when an nnsupported charge 
McCall jg disproved, some people will shake their heads and say 
it is very unfortunate that it should have been necessary 
to establish innocence, as if reproof belonged rather to 
the innocent victim than to the author of the calumny. 
I have alluded to the Seventh of March Speech, 
which has been accounted one of his crimes. One 
other matter I shall notice because it bears upon a point 
which has often been conceded to be the weak place in 
his character. It so happens that in this case a slander 
was tested and the evidence upon it carefully marshalled 
before a Congressional investigating committee. He 
was charged in Congress with a misuse of the Secret 
Service Fund while Secretary of State. A resolution of 
inquiry upon the subject was presented in the Senate 
while he was a member of that body. He opposed it. 
Rather a singular course, it might be said, for an inno- 
cent man to take. It would ordinarily be regarded as 
an evidence of guilt. It might also show an extraordi- 
nary degree of public virtue and indicate one of the 
rare men to whotn the interests of their country were 
dearer than their own, even than their own reputations. 
What it implied in this instance may be inferred from 
the event. 

A law had been framed evidently on the theory that 
in conducting the government it would sometimes be 
necessary to employ secret agents for confidential pur- 
poses, and a fund was created to be expended upon the 
sole responsibility of the President. A publication of 
the special disbursements would violate the spirit of the 
law, and, to say nothing of the bad faith with reference 

158 



to the past, might cripple the government in its future Samuel 
operations. Webster declared in the Senate that every Walker 
dollar had been spent for a proper public purpose, but "'l^Call 
that he could not wish to see an important principle 
and law violated for any persoml convenience to him- 
self. The Senate refused to make the inquiry. The 
author of the charges, writhing under the lashing which 
Webster had administered to him in a speech in the Sen- 
ate, again pressed them in the House and a committee 
of investigation was appointed. That committee was 
politically hostile to Webster and was appointed with a 
view to his impeachment, if the charges were sustained. 
It made a thorough investigation and it appeared, as the 
outcome of it all, that Webster had not indeed displayed 
the highest skill as an accountant, but it appeared also 
that he himself had paid the amount of certain lost 
vouchers out of his own pocket. The report concluded 
that there was no proof " to impeach Mr. Webster's in- 
tegrity or the purity of his motives in the discharge of 
the duties of his office." And that report exonerating 
the defender of the Union will not lose weight from the 
fact that it bears the name of Jefferson Davis. 

It is true that his friends contributed considerable 
sums of money to his support, and for this he was se- 
verely criticised. Burke received from his friends dur- 
ing his life, gifts, or loans that were never repaid, to an 
enormous amount for those days. Fox's friends gave him 
an annuity of $15,000. I do not know that it has oc- 
curred to anyone to accuse either of them of impropriety. 
Can it be doubted that Webster's friends were as much 
attached to him, or that they gave from pure personal 
loyalty mingled with a desire to maintain in the service 

159 



Samuel of their countn', talents as splendid as ever Fox or Burke 
Walker possessed, and that were even more successfully eni- 
McCall ployed ? It is to be regretted from the abuse to which his 
example may give rise that he found it necessary to re- 
ceive this aid. The danger is that a far lesser man than 
Webster in a high public place might receive a more 
calculating homage. However, each case must be judged 
on its own merits. It is ver\' true that he was not a 
bookkeeper. But if accounts had been carefully kept, 
it may be doubted whether even from the money stand- 
point he did not give more than he received. Instead 
of neglecting his profession and eking out his expenses 
by the aid of friends, he might have remained out of the 
public service and enjoyed the most lucrative practice at 
the American bar. His father and his brother made 
great sacrifices to educate him, but it must also not be 
forgotten that he taught school, and at the same time 
copied two large volumes of deeds at night and gener- 
ously gave the proceeds of it all to his brother ; and that 
he assumed and paid his father's debts. He certainly was 
not a man "who much receives but nothing gives." 
He had a regal nature and men would give him their all 
because he was as free and generous as he was receptive. 
There is a strong light thrown upon this trait of 
his character by an incident which among great 
speeches and public policies may seem an unimportant 
incident, and yet as showing the real character of 
the man is a great one. A young man who had been 
employed by him in connection with his farms in the 
West came to Washington, where he fell ill. Webster 
was at that time nearly sixty years old, at the summit 
of his fame and engrossed in his public duties. But he 

160 



saw this farmer's boy sick in the city among strangers. Snmuel 
He took care of him with his own hands. For a week Walker 
he was with him almost constantly day and night. McCall 
Critics have applied to this generous nature the little 
standards for little men. They have told us that he 
ought not to have been extravagant ; that he did not 
closely calculate his expenses ; that he did not carefully 
keep his accounts ; and as they would arraign a petty 
criminal before a police court, they have harried this 
transcendent figure at history's bar. They demanded 
too much of Nature. If she had tried to do more for 
him upon whom she had lavished so many gifts, she 
mieht indeed have made him a great clerk or book- 
keeper, but she might also have spoiled him as a states- 
man. Careless he may have been, but anything like con- 
scious corruption was utterly alien to his nature. 

And now having spoken to you, I fear much too 
long, of those things in his career which I thought best 
suited for bringing out my idea of him, let us look back 
at him for a moment before we leave him. We have 
seen hira the greatest lawyer of his time and one of the 
o-reatest orators of all times. We have seen him, too, 
the resolute and masterful statesman, not swayed by 
trifles, but aiming to govern according to far-sighted 
policies a nation dominated by great principles and of 
chief consequence to itself or mankind only as it faith- 
fully adhered to them ; a statesman who shed a white 
light far across the future pathway of his own country, 
and who illuminated, too, the courses of self-governing 
nations, wherever they might exist. He never out- 
grew the simple loves of his youth. At Alarshfield it 
was his habit to rise before daybreak to watch the 

J6I 



Samuel coming- of the dawn. It was said that his cattle knew 
Walker him, and, even more than his open hospitality, his herds 
McCall of fine oxen kept him poor. It was one of his pleasures 
to feed them with ears of corn out of his own hand, and 
only a few days before he died he had some of the 
noblest of them brought before his window that he 
might get comfort from looking out upon their broad 
brows and their great mild eyes. The passion for fishing 
never left him. He delighted to wade in some brook 
for trout, but of all things he loved to go out in a little 
skiff upon the sea. "Marshfield and the sea, the sea," 
he would cry when the burdens of political life grew 
heavy upon him. The farmers about his home loved 
him and it so happened that they gathered together 
from miles around and went out in a great procession to 
meet him when he returned to ]\Iarshfield the last 
summer of his life. Those who knew him best, his 
family and his near friends, were devoted to him. What 
he was as a statesman and an orator, he was as a man. 
To the College which, now well into the second 
century of her life, still has upon her the freshness of 
the morning, those early years of struggle, no less nar- 
row and straitened for her than for him, take on an 
air of romance. To me, no other part of his career 
seems so much to be reverenced as when that matchless 
youth in all the innocence and perfection of nature, with 
those infinite possibilities in his soul, received here the 
first of the lessons which taught him how to use his 
superb gifts for the benefit of mankind. The campus 
hedged with elms, yonder venerable hall, these encir- 
cling hills, whether clad with the green of springtime 
or, as now, flaming with the gold of autumn, became a 

162 



part of his life and all speak to us of him. Men die, Samuel 
but the College is immortal. A hundred classes have "Walker 
followed him and hundreds more I doubt not will yet McCall 
prolong the line. Her sons will continue to bear their 
part where the intellectual strife is the fiercest and where 
shape is given to the destinies of their times. But what- 
ever the future may bring to the College, however she 
may hereafter "teem with new prodigies," she will 
always proudly cherish and, as the succeeding centuries 
roll around, will reverently commemorate, the fame of 
Daniel Webster. 



Conferring of Honorary Degrees. 

By the President of the College. 
RESIDENT Tucker in conferring the honorary 
degrees said : 
"The trustees of Dartmouth College direct me to 



P 



vm 



express their pleasure in inviting into our academic fel- 
lowship the following persons through the honorary de- 
gree of Master of Arts: 

"Samuel Appleton, of St. Paul, Minnesota; Frank 
Dunklee Currier, Congressman, vSecond District of 
New Hampshire; James Waldron Remick, Judge of the 
Supreme Court of New Hampshire; Harry Gene vSar- 
gent, Mayor of Concord ; Wendell Phillips Stafford, 
Judge of the Supreme Court of Vermont. 

"The trustees of Dartmouth College authorize me 
to confer upon the following persons the honorary 
degree of Doctor of Laws : 

"Chester Bradley Jordan ; Governor of the State of 
New Hampshire, honorable in purpose, sagacious in 
counsel, decisive in action. 

163 



Honorary ' ' Edgar Aldrich ; Judge of the United States District 

Degrees Court for New Hampshire, whose dignity conserves the 

tradition of the bench, whose sense of justice accords 

with the spirit of the law, whose love of literature 

enriches his learning and adorns his speech. 

"William Eaton Chandler ; for forty-six years an 
able servant of the state and of the country, initiator of 
the new navy, actively identified with the aggressive 
policy of the nation, bold, astute, tenacious, rich in 
sentiment and feeling. 

"James Fairbanks Colby; jurist and teacher, thorough 
in research, independent in opinion, inflexible in ideals 
of justice and duty. 

"Frank Swett Black ; lawyer and executive, clear 
and direct of purpose, strong and fearless in municipal 
reform, a student of law, a leader of men, tnie to him- 
self in professional and public life. 

"Francis Brown; scholar , honor to an honorable 
name, of repute at home, of repute abroad, staunch in 
loyalty to truth, at the forefront in theological progress. 

"Samuel Walker McCall; Member of Congress from 
the Eighth District of Massachusetts, student of men and 
of events, who reads the issues of the times, not in the 
glare of the hour, but in the light of history, steadfast 
in conviction, strong in utterance, in action above ex- 
pediency. 

"William Everett ; Head Master of the Adams 
school, highly endowed and variously accomplished, an 
ornament to the professions he has served, delighting 
most in the ancient calling of schoolmaster. 

"Edward Everett Hale; venerated and beloved, 
comforter and quickener of men, devoted to the social 

(64 



well beinor, whose citizenship is acknowledo^ed alike in Honorary 
the republic of letters, of the state, and of religion. Degrees 

"George Frisbie Hoar; senior Senator from Massa- 
chusetts, fit successor of Webster, master of speech, 
advocate of freedom, a patriot who widens the bounds 
of party to satisfy the demands of liberty and justice. 

"Melville Weston Fuller; Chief Justice of the 
United States, graduate of Bowdoin, of Dartmouth 
lineage and succession, grandson of Judge Henry Weld 
Fuller of the class of 1801, grandson of Chief Justice 
Nathan Weston of the class of 1803, successor in office 
to Salmon Portland Chase of the class of 1826, who adds 
to inheritance and succession, learning, insight, char- 
acter, watchful guardian of the Constitution, firm 
arbiter of justice. 

"I am also authorized by the trustees of Dartmouth 
College to confer the degree of Doctor of Laws upon the 
following persons in absence : 

"James Bryce ; interpreter of the American people 
and of the American government to the world. 

"John Hay ; pilot of the ship of State through un- 
charted seas. 

"Booker Taliafero Washington ; leader of a race out 
of childhood into manhood. 

"I am also authorized to announce that at a meeting 
of the trustees held in June it was voted to confer the 
degree of Doctor of Laws upon Frank Palmer Goulding 
of the class of 1863, who has fallen from our ranks, 
leaving to us the honor of his character, attainments, 
and career." 

The recipients of the degrees were greeted with 
great enthusiasm, the whole audience rising to its feet 

i65 



Honorary as the degree was conferred upon Senator Hoar and 
Degrees upon Chief Justice Fuller. The enthusiasm was no less 
marked in the case of those upon whom degrees were 
conferred in absence. 



i66 



'^he Exercises of 
Wednesday Afternoon 



Program. 

The site of "Webster Hall is on the lot at the northeast cor- 
ner of the Qjoimon, opposite Rollins Chapel. The lot was 
given by the Honorable Levi Parsons Morton, LL. D., 
Honorary *SU The building is erected through the con- 
tributions of the alumni. The architect is Charles Alonzo 
Rich, 75, of New York. At 2:30 o^cIock a vast assembly 
was gathered to listen to the addresses and to witness the 
ceremonies attending the laying of the corner-stone. 
March from Tannhauser. Wagner 

Salem Cadet Band. 
Choral Invocation — Domine Salvam Fac. Gounod 

Address of the Presiding Officer, Frank Sherman Streeter, 
Esquire, 74, of the Board of Trustees, Chairman of the 
Building Committee. 
Address by the Honorable Frank Swett Black, 75. 
Laying of the corner-stone of Webster Hall by Lewis Addi- 
son Armistead, great grandson of Daniel Webster. 
Chorus — Praise ye the Father. Gounod 

Prayer of Dedication by the Reverend Cyrus Richardson, 

D. D., '64. 
Chorus— Men of Dartmouth. cMorse 

Exercises in the Old Chapel. 
Out-of-Door Concert by the Salem Cadet Band. 



Address of tlie Presiding Oiificer. 

By Frank Sherman Streeter, Esquire, '74. 
Mr. President and Friends: 

RING the last six years, the trustees have 
erected six new buildings, at a cost of some- 
what more than four hundred thousand dollars. 
Richardson and Fayerweather are devoted to the dormi- 
tory life of the students. Butterfield and Wilder fur- 

169 



D 



Frank nish a home for two of the important departments of the 

Sherman College. The Central Heatins^ Station is a most valu- 

Strceler able addition to the general College plant, and College 

Hall is designed to become the center of student social 

life. 

We are now beginning the erection of a new 
structure which is to serve a double purpose. In this 
building will be carried on the active administration of 
the College. On the main floor will be found the of- 
fices of the president, treasurer, dean, trustees, and 
faculty. Here will be the working center of the Col- 
lege life. The upper floor will be used exclusively for 
academic occasions. In a statelv hall will be orathered 
and preserved all that will keep fresh in the general 
mind the romantic beginnings of the College, her 
splendid history, and the fine achievements of her more 
illustrious sons in the work of the world. 

Here the active administration of the Colleg-e will 
be carried on under the very eye, as it were, of all that 
is best and noblest in her past history. The president, 
the trustees, and the faculty unite in the belief that the 
history, sentiments, and traditions, here to be ever 
present, will be of large value in aiding them to ad- 
minister wisely this great charitable trust. 

The College has invited one of her most dis- 
tinguished and honored sons to say the fitting word 
on this great occasion. I present to you the Honorable 
Frank Swett Black, a graduate of the class of 1S75 and 
ex-Governor of the state of New York. 



J 70 



Address at tHe Laying of tHe Cor- Frank 
ner-Stone of Webster Hall. ^wett 

Black 
By the Honorable Frank S%ett Black, '75, 

Mr, President, Gentlemen ot Dartmouth College, and 

Fellow Citizens : 
^—^1 HIS simple ceremony, unmarked by pretense or 
1 display, beginning a structure dedicated to the 
cold pursuit of learning, exposes to the ob- 



servant eye that American trait which is the stone 
on which the corner of the national temple stands and 
where the heaviest timbers rest. It is that respect for 
order, liberty and law which stands against every 
trial and which no commotion can dislodge or break. 
Underneath, as all support must be, naked of adorn- 
ment or inscription, imbedded in the earth where no eye 
can behold and no applause can cheer, it rests serene 
in its everlasting work, unmoved in its native strength. 
Over its head the tower may rise with gilded dome and 
commemorative arch to excite the wonder of the throng, 
but it alone, in silent and complete obscurity, will rest 
forever unapplauded and unseen. And yet it is the base 
without which no monument can stand. It is the foun- 
dation whose weakness or decay would bring all the 
glory standing over it to ruin and despair. It was not 
by show or glitter or by sound that the great moments 
of history were marked, and the great deeds of mankind 
were wrought. The color counts for nothing ; it is the 
fibre alone that lasts. The precept will be forgotten 
unless the deed is remembered. The wildest strains of 
martial music will pass away on the wind, while the 
grim and deadly courage of the soldier, moving and 

Mi 



Frankacting without a word, will mark the spot where pil- 
Swettgrims of every race will linger and worship forever. 
Black No character in the world more clearly saw the 

worth of substance and the mockery of show than he in 
whose honor this structure will be reared. And this 
tribute to him who for nearly half a century has been 
gone from the sight of men is a tribute also to those 
who remember and respect the qualities which he ex- 
emplified, and to that renowned institution where his 
early years were spent. His college is no longer a 
"lesser light on the literary horizon of our country." 
It has risen and increased from the hour of his devout and 
matchless service until its kindly light has encircled the 
world, revealing and proclaiming in its great career the 
doctrine that, although vanity and pretense may flourish 
for a day, there can be no lasting triumph not founded 
on the truth. 

The life of Daniel Webster moved upon that high, 
consistent plane which the surroundings of his youth in- 
spired. Poverty is a hard but oftentimes a loving 
nurse. If fortune denies the luxuries of wealth, she 
makes generous compensation in that greater love which 
they alone can know who have faced privations together. 
The child may shiver in the fury of the blast, which no 
maternal tenderness can shield him from, but he may 
feel a helpless tear dropped upon his cheek which will 
keep him warm till the snows of time have covered his 
hair. It is not wealth that counts in the making: of the 
world, but character. And character is best formed 
amid those conditions when every waking hour is filled 
with struggle, where no flag of truce is ever sent and 
only darkness stays the conflict. Give me the hut that 

172 



is small enough, the poverty that is deep enough, the Frank 
love that is great enough, and I will raise from them the Swett 
best there is in human character. And so it came to *^i^ck 
pass that Daniel Webster left his home for college bear- 
ing those possessions which gold could not buy nor 
thieves despoil him of. And on this spot where nature 
seemed to do her best, this noble institulion which he 
loved developed with patient care his splendid powers. 
This lad, uncouth and poor, without aid or accidental 
circumstance, rising as steadily as the sun, marked a 
path across the sky so luminous and clear that there is 
not one to mate it to be discovered in the heavens, and 
throughout its whole majestic length there is no spot or 
blemish in it. Injustice is the lot of every man, and 
Webster had his share. He had stood in the open field 
for many years and round him shone a constant, steady 
liglit. He had borne responsibility with such dignity 
and power that universal admiration followed him. He 
had been in many a desperate conflict, and in each his 
was the giant mind, and from each he had worn away 
the victor's wreath. Proud yet sensitive, strong and 
yet dependent, conscious of his own integrity, filled with 
intense devotion to his country, around the head of this 
majestic figure descended that storm of bitter and un- 
reasoning anger which always gathers when deep con- 
victions have settled in fiery hearts. 

No great reform has ever been accomplished in this 
world without some attending outrage which would cov- 
er a smaller cause with shame. When the blood is hot 
and passion is in control, the man who steps before the 
multitude to raise the warning finger will be trodden un- 
der foot, for anger sees in reason only the sign of 

J73 



Frank treachen-. And so there fell across the path of him 
Swett whose life had been devoted to the cause of liberty and 
Black union a deep and cruel shadow through which he 
could not pass. 

When old wrongs have been acknowledged and 
deeds long misinterpreted have been finally understood, 
these things the dead can never know, and this is the 
saddest of all the grave's relentless cruelties. But those 
who live to see in undisturbed perspective the grandeur 
of his character have realized that through all his life 
his purposes were honorable and high. The most en- 
during coUnnn on which this Union rests was fashioned 
by his hand. Through all this nation's unexampled 
progress there has been no loftier motive or ideal than 
those his genius has inspired. And even now, when 
fifty years have passed, a length of time sufhcient to 
erase the letters in which most great names are 
carved, the doctrines he established are still the nation's 
accepted chart, the precepts he enunciated are still po- 
tent in the nation's life. He believed in individual free- 
dom governed by tolerance and sobriety, but above all 
he believed in that loyal devotion to country, ever ready 
to be sacrificed on the altar of national permanence and 
success. The love of justice and fair play, and that re- 
spect for order and the law which must underlie every 
nation that would long endure, were deeply imbedded 
in his nature. These, I know, are qualities destitute of 
show, and whose names are never set to music, but un- 
less there is in the people's hearts a deep sense of their 
everlasting value, that people can neither command 
respect in the time of their prosperity nor sympathy in 
the hour of their decay. 

174 



These are the qualities that stand the test when Frank 
hurricanes sweep by. These are the joints of oak that Swett 
ride the storm, and when the clouds have melted find Black 
the waves are still, move on serenely in their course. 
Other timbers have strewed the bottom of every sea on 
which the ship of human government has ever sailed, 
but not these. Times will come when nothing but the 
best will save us. Without warning and without cause, 
out of a clear and smiling sky, may descend the bolt 
that will scatter the weaker qualities to the winds. 
We have seen that bolt but recently descend and fill the 
country and the world with universal grief. Kings and 
peasants, with a common impulse, the high and low of 
every craft and creed and station with human hearts 
within their bosoms have bowed their heads to the 
wave of overwhelming sorrow. There is danger at such 
a time. The bolt has descended. The hurricane is 
passing like the rushing of the sea. Now is the time to 
see whether government and chaos can ever be the same. 
Now is the time to see whether the American character 
can stand amid these perilous surroundings. Now is 
the time when justice and fair play, order and the law, 
must stand on guard. These are the qualities that have 
lately saved us from an error which many years would 
not obliterate. 

If in that awful wrath that recently inflamed the 
world, bewildered men had seized the reins of law, there 
is not a pulpit or a cloister from end to end of Christen- 
dom that would not have devoutly prayed that the deed 
should be forgiven, but if retribution had so come along 
that swift and fiery track, the cause of human govern- 



t75 



Frank ment would have felt a staggering blow aud justice 

Swett -would have covered up her face. 

Black ^\\e American character has been often proved 

superior to any test. No danger can be so great and no 
calamity so sudden as to throw it off its guard. This 
great strength in times of trial and this self-restraint in 
times of wild excitement have been attained by years of 
training, precept and experience. The fires of youth 
have been restrained by the admonitions of age. Justice 
has so often emerged triumphant from obstacles which 
seemed to chain her limbs and make the righteous path 
impossible, that there is now rooted in the American 
heart the unshaken faith that no matter how dark the 
night there will somehow break through at the appointed 
hour a light which shall reveal to their eager eyes the 
upright forms of Justice and the Law, still moving 
hand in hand, still supreme over chaos and despair, the 
image and the substance of the world's sublime reliance. 
To this result the great of every age have made 
their contribution, and on the roll of honor near the 
head will stand his name with which this venerated 
institution is forever linked. And as the years advance 
and the great figures of the world, moving each day 
farther toward the horizon, grow small and indistinct, 
the admiration of humanity will grow more enlightened 
and profound for that stupendous frame which emerged 
from that humble home in Salisbury, now at rest 
forever under the Marsh field elms. 



176 



Laying of tHe Corner Stone. Laying 

Words of the "Presiding Officer. °J ^^^ _ 

Corner Stone 



T 



HE trustees have determined that this building, 
dedicated to the preservation of the past and 
the active uses of the present and future, shall 
bear the name of her greatest son and be forever known 
as Webster Hall. Within this stone which is about to be 
put in place, there have been deposited the following 
memorials : 
Volume of "The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel 

Webster," used as text-book in Dartmouth College. 
Photograph from daguerreotype of Daniel Webster. 
Ten cent postage stamp, betrrg^ portr ait of_ _panlel 

Webster. 
Program of Webster Centennial, Dartmouth College, 

1901. 
General Catalogue of Dartmouth College, 1900. 
Annual Catalogue of Dartmouth College, 1900-1 901. 
Catalogue of portraits in gallery of Dartmouth College. 
Views of the principal buildings of Dartmouth College. 
Inaugural address of President Tucker, June 28, 1893. 
Last number of The Dartmouth. 
Last number of the Dartmouth Magazine. 

It is fitting that the chief block in the foundation 
of this building should be laid by a lineal descendant of 
the man whose memory is here to be preserved in en- 
during stone. That service will now be performed by 
Lewis Addison Armistead of Boston, a great grandson of 
Daniel Webster. 

The corner-stone having been placed in position, 
under direction of Alexander Anderson McKenzie, '91, 

t77 



/ 




Laying Engineer in Charge, Mr. Armistead addressing the presi- 
of the dent and trustees of the College said, "Mr. President, I 
Corner Stone hereby pronounce the corner-stone of Webster Hall 
laid." 



E-xercises in tHe Old CKapel. 

rT-trry MMEDIATELY after the exercises following the 
laying of the corner-stone a considerable part of 
the audience proceeded to the Old Chapel to 



•^ 



I 



listen to reminiscences of Mr. Webster by some of the 
older graduates and guests. 

The Honorable Stephen INIoody Crosby, '49, who 
had personal knowledge of ]Mr. Webster, and was famil- 
iar with the circumstances of Mr. Webster's life and 
career, presided. 

Words of the Presiding Officer, 

There are not many of us left now that can remem- 
ber having seen Mr. Webster in his prime, and if the lips 
which must soon be closed in that silence which knows 
no breaking do not speak now it will not be possible 
for those who are younger to hear anything which shall 
come direct from men who knew the man in whose 
honor we meet to-day. Perhaps you will excuse me if 
I open, as no list of speakers has been furnished me. I 
have had no intimation from more than one or two 
members that they would be prepared or would have 
anything to say. I shall go a-fishing, therefore, for 
speakers, and I only hope I shall so bait my hook that 
I shall not fail to make a catch wherever I throw out 
my line. 

t78 



Personally I may say, as a brilliant young female Reminiscences 
member of my family who, perhaps, is present here to- of Mr. "Webster 
day and who will, perhaps, correct me, said, "I was 
brought up on Daniel Webster." I had him for dinner 
when I was a boy, and had him cold for supper, and 
warmed over in the morning for breakfast. IMy mater- 
nal grandfather came into New Hampshire in the clos- 
ing years of the eighteenth century, and established 
himself in the practice of law about the time that ]\Ir. 
Webster graduated. He knew Mr. Webster through 
the early years of his practice at the New Hampshire 
bar, while he was a rising lawyer, and knew him until 
he transferred his allegiance to the Massachusetts bar. 
The acquaintance then made was continued through 
life, and Mr. Webster was an occasional visitant at my 
grandfather's house. I never saw him there. But I 
heard the stories of him which were innumerable, and, I 
have no doubt, thoroughly reliable. Many of them re- 
lated to the early days, and to the peculiarities of his 
disposition and character, some of which are now 
doubted, and some of which had better, perhaps, never 
be repeated. 

Something has been said recently about his indo- 
lence of habits. I am inclined to think that so far as 
active, useful, physical exertion was concerned, what- 
ever he may have liked to do as a fisherman or a hunter, 
in regard to active physical exertion, I am inclined to 
think he was a great adept at avoiding it. The old story 
which I heard long before I realized its value, of the 
scythe, when he was sent out by his father to help the 
mowers, of the scythe which could not be made to 
"hang" to suit him until he hung it over the limbs of 

179 



Reminiscences the historic apple-tree I do not doubt. Neither have I 
of Mr. Webster any reason to doubt the story that when he was called 
to account for what he might have done in connection 
with his brother wlio had been charged with certain 
duties during the father's absence, and the brother hav- 
ing confessed to having done nothing, Daniel claimed to 
have spent his time helping that brother: "Been 
a-helpin' Zeke, father." I have no doubt that that is 
correct also. 

In after years, the first time I remember to have 
heard Webster I was a boy thirteen or fourteen per- 
haps, when he returned from the Tyler Cabinet at Wash- 
ington in political disgrace, to his friends in Massachu- 
setts. The political story need not be repeated, but he 
came back to Boston and the cold shoulder was turned 
towards him with almost none to do him honor. A meet- 
ing was arranged in Faneuil Hall in order that he might 
make his statement as to why he had stayed in Tyler's 
Cabinet. My father who was a life-long admirer and 
lover of Daniel Webster took me there as a boy to serve 
out to me a part of that diet of Webster. I remember 
the crush, I remember only as a boy how my father got 
up with me into a place near the platform. I remember 
the crowd and my difficulty in seeing o\'er the heads of 
the men who thronged that hall. I remember when 
Mr. Webster came upon the stage in his magnificent 
court dress, which he always wore on state occasions — 
not as it was mimicked here last evening with buff 
trousers and a coat of black, but a magnificent figure of 
a man who looked as Carlyle said of him, like a 
cathedral. He came to the front when it was his turn 
to speak, and some one called for three cheers and they 

(80 



were not given. One of them was given, the second Reminiscences 
failed in the attempt, nor was there any hand-clapping of Mr. Webster 
that would ordinarily be bestowed npon a man so 
prominent. His eyes absolntely blazed. They looked 
to me like two ship-lights at sea. He began his speech 
in a calm conversational tone, and went on for a little 
while to tell the happenings in Washington following 
the death of Harrison. Enlarging a little, he went on to 
say in more earnest tones that his pnrpose was to tell 
the people there present the history of the administration 
and the reasons why certain things were done in the 
way they were done, but that as for him — and I wish I 
could recall the precise words as he drew himself up and 
said — "If there are any gentlemen here who expect to 
hear from my lips a word of explanation or apology for 
my remaining in the cabinet of John Tyler, they are 
likely to go home as wise as they came," and he roared 
it out through the hall in such a way that he dominated 
that great audience, and they gave him three cheers. 
Before the close of the evening — he spoke about 
an hour and a half — they almost lifted the roof with 
their cheers and hand-clapping, and when the speech 
was ended they closed with cheers again. It made a 
great impression iipon me as a boy. I did not under- 
stand it fully, but the marvelous power of the man so to 
dominate and control that audience was a thing which 
I uever shall forget, and which I never have seen before 
or since in any orator. 

I occasionally saw him on the street, that mag- 
nificent presence of his, walking on Washington Street, 
looking neither to the right nor to the left, and followed 
everywhere by a train of admiring people, or else 

m 



Reminiscences everybody stoppincy to gaze and look after liim \vlien lie 
ot Mr . w ebster i^^^^ passed. Again I saw liini when he came up to 
Lebanon below here, at the openino; of the Northern 
Railroad in 1847. He made a speech there, in the 
freight house or in an extemporized building, congratu- 
lating the State and the people at large upon the opening 
of that great artery of commerce. It was not anything 
to draw out his powers, his great powers of speech, and 
I have no recollection of his speech except as to the 
dense crowd and his effective manner. 

Again I saw him the last year of his life when 
he was feeble, broken, when he came to Boston, and 
some kind of an ovation was tendered him. He really 
was not well enough to speak at all, though he did 
attempt to make a speech, which made so little im- 
pression upon me that I think it must have been a 
pitiable sort of an exhibition of a broken down, feeble, 
infirm man. 

Of course I came up here to hear that magnificent 
eulogy wliich Rufus Choate pronounced upon him in the 
College Church; the music and the magnificent oratory' 
of that day and hour I still remember very vividly. 
Allusions have been made to it two or three times in 
the exercises here in the last two days, and it deser\-ed 
everything in the way of commendation that has been 
bestowed upon it. 

There is another reminiscence in connection with 
Webster that occurs to me now, and that is of a character 
which would once, perhaps, have possessed some signifi- 
cance. If there are any among the older alumni here 
who remember my father, they will know if there ever 
was a man upon whom anything like superstition made 

182 



no kind of impress, it was he. Nothing distnrbed him Reminiscences 

that was apparently out of the natural order. What- of Mr. Webster 

ever was, had a reason, had a cause, had some distinct 

purpose, but that there was ever anything supernatural 

about it, anything out of the ordinary, never found a 

rest in his heart for a moment. But this thing he used 

to tell as a curious coincidence. He was very much 

interested in regard to the sickness of Mr. Webster, and 

was receiving news every day, as it was furnished by 

the telegraph to the papers, of Mr. Webster's failing 

condition. One morning he awoke suddenly and spoke 

to my mother. He said, "Did you speak?" 

"No." 

"Well, somebody touched me on the shoulder, I 
thought, and said to me, 'Mr. Webster is passing 



away ' " 



Well, she laughed at him. "You dreamed it. You 
have thought so much on that the last few days that 
that is not strange. You have been dreaming." 

He looked at his watch and saw what the time 
was, and simply made a note of it. When the papers 
came that day he found that Mr. Webster had passed 
away at that time and hour and almost moment. He 
told the story as a curious coincidence. I do not believe 
that it ever affected him or disturbed him as anything 
that was out of the ordinary, or that had the slightest 
touch of what we should call now by some of the modern 
names, such as mind reading, or hypnotism, or Christian 
Science, or something of the kind, but it was the last 
reminiscence which lingered in my mind in regard to 
Daniel Webster. 



183 



Reminiscences Now haviiio; made my little speech and having, as I 

of Mr. Webster say, no list whatever of speakers who are here I nmst 
call at random. I should like to know if Judge Cross 
of the class of '41 is in the Chnpel. 

Judge Va'bid Cross, LL.T>,,'4i. 

I do n't think this is fair, -Mr. President. I wandered 
about this building and looked into the door and asked 
a man if I could get in behind him so that they would 
not see me, and so that I could hear somebody speak, 
and I crawled in, thinking and hoping that I should not 
be called upon. Besides, Mr. President, I have agreed 
to say something this evening and you ought not to 
expect me to say anything here, but I am here, and I 
am not going to back out. 

You suggested that, perhaps, there were but few 
that knew Daniel Webster or that saw him. Well, I 
hope there are some. You thought that I had, perhaps. 
In 1S40 there was a Whig convention or a Wliig meet- 
ing at Orford, and I, a collegian, went with the rest. 
Daniel Webster was announced to speak. He did not 
come until late and there was no one there to talk. 
After inquiring around we had a young man in college 
then that we thought was the smartest speaker that 
there was in the country, and we all hurrahed for Jim 
Barrett. And Jim Barrett took the stand. He made a 
speech from half an hour to an hour in length. Daniel 
Webster came on afterwards, and we all voted that Jim 
Barrett beat him. 

Now, I heard Daniel Webster on that occasion. 
I heard him in court in Boston. I heard him in Man- 
chester. I heard him in the vScnate of the United 

184 



States. I heard him on several occasions, but the only Reminiscences 
occasion which clings to my memory is that of the of Mr. Webster 
completion of Bunker Hill i\Ionument. 1 was then a 
student in the Law School of Harvard, and went with 
the students so that we had a good position not far 
from the speaker. 

Mr. Webster stood with his back to the monument, 
willi fifty thousand or more people to the front and on 
the sides of him. I saw Daniel Webster as he stood 
upon the platform. I have him in my mind's eye now 
as he was with his back to the monument with the fifty 
thousand people before him. I heard him for an hour 
or more. The words of that speech have gone from 
me, but yet I remember him most clearly and distinctly 
as he stood there. I cannot tell the words. I shall not 
be able to give you an idea of it, perhaps, but as he 
stood before us he turned his face to the monument, 
his back to us, and said, apostrophizing that monu- 
ment, "That is the orator of the day." I will not 
attempt to give his words, but the thrill that went 
throuo-h that audience, the thrill as I felt it at that 
hour has been with me from that hour to this. That 
was a Websterian hour. It was an hour such as was 
seen in the Dartmouth College Case, in the Knapp Case, 
and in the other cases alluded to to-day. As I have 
journeyed through the city of Boston since then, as I 
have looked at that stone monument, I do not know 
how it is, but every time I pass that monument it seems 
to speak to me. I cannot help it. The thrill goes 
through my veins as it did in 1843. That monument to 
me is alive. It speaks to me in thoughts that Webster 
breathed and words that Webster gave us. Friends, 

185 



Reminiscences that hour was worth a lifetime almost to me. It was a 
01 Mr. Webster thrill such as I never felt before nor since. I have 
listened to Henry Clay in the United States Senate, to 
Rufus Choate in his eulogy, and I have heard Choate 
before the jury, and other men, but never on any other 
occasion has such a thrill run through me as then. 

But, fellow alumni, you have heard of Webster's 
statesmanship, of his great ability as a lawyer. We 
have heard of them all. They have been talked and 
printed and preached about, but as I come back here to- 
day, my thoughts, although I have heard much of Dan- 
iel Webster, go back to that Salisbury home. I re- 
member him in thought as a young man. You, most 
of you, look upon him as a historical person, but let us 
realize that he was a New Hampshire boy, with New 
Hampshire affections, that he lived at the parental man- 
sion in his younger years as a New Hampshire boy. 
You remember that time when he rode with his father. 
I do n't remember whether it has been told here to-day. 
Perhaps it has, and perhaps it has not, but you have 
read of that hour when his fatlier disclosed to him on 
his way to Rev. Mr. Wood his intention to send him to 
college. You remember that Daniel Webster then fell 
upon his father's neck and cried as a child. That was the 
Webster boy ; that was the Webster man. You remem- 
ber when his brother Ezekiel wished to 2:0 to coUes^e and 
his father had not the means, how he went to Frye- 
burg and taught school and saved his three hundred 
dollars and gave it to his brother Ezekiel, and sent him 
to college. Where is the young man or boy that has 
done that for a brother? Where among the college 
students have I found one that has made a sacrifice 

186 



such as that ? Talk of Daniel Webster as a states- Reminiscences 
man and a great lawyer. He was also a great brother of Mr. Webster 
that gave to his brother the means to help him through 
college. Daniel Webster was great as a statesman, but 
greater as a New Hampshire man, as a brother, and as 
a true man. 

The Chairman : Judge Cross alluded to ^Ir. Web- 
ster's kindness of heart and to his affection. That brings 
to my mind a fact of which I was informed not long 
since that there is here to-day the original of a letter 
which he wrote when a member of Congress to the father 
of a fellow member of Congress, Mr. Cilley, of New 
Hampshire, who, you remember was killed in a duel at 
Washington. That letter was written to the father of 
his deceased fellow member, and it expresses the same 
kindness and regard for his fellows which you would 
expect from a boy who grew up from the youth which 
Judge Cross has pictured to us. Mr. Cilley, Brother 
Cilley, alumnus of the class of 1863, has that letter in 
his possession, and I should like to have him produce it 
and read it to this gathering. 

Mr. Horatio Gates Cilley, '63 : It is indeed true 
that my brother and myself have this letter in our pos- 
session, but on this trip I was obliged to come by way 
of White River Junction, and I have not the original 
with me. With }'our permission I have turned the 
letter over to Dr. Cilley of Boston, of the class of '68, 
who will read it to you. 

Dr. Orren George Cilley, A. I^I., '68 : We have 
been heaving for the last two hours about the meritori- 
ous acts of Daniel Webster, his peculiarities, his habits, 
his law, his oratory, and, in fact, of everything that is 

187 



Reminiscences good. Still no one that I have heard has said anything 
of Mr. Webster in particular about his large and generous heart. They 
have not said anything of the time when he was in his 
home, when his mind recurred to those people, friends 
who were in trouble, and how he sat down and wrote 
them letters, the like of which I will read to you. I 
have in my pocket the original of the letter. It is badly 
broken and I will with your permission read a copy of 
it. 

Dr. Cilley then read a typewritten copy of the 
original letter. 



'&' 



Vr, fabez "Baxter Upham,c/1. cM., '49. 
(Prepared for the occasion but not spoken.) 

Although without any personal acquaintance with 
Mr. Webster, it has been my good fortune to have seen 
and heard him in some of his most eloquent and power- 
ful speeches. 

The first occasion of this kind which I recall was in 
the autumn of 1840, at Orford in this state, in the 
memorable campaign of Harrison and Tyler — "Of Tip- 
pecanoe and Tyler too," as we boys used to phrase it 
in our college songs. There was great enthusiasm 
amongst us at that time, for, then as now, a very large 
majority of the students of the College were on the side 
of the Whigs, as the party was termed. It would be 
called the Republican party to-day, I suppose. 

The morning, as I remember it, dawned fair and 
clear — one of those typical October days of which this 
favored region has its full complement. The whole 
College was early astir, and, with appropriate mottoes 
and banners, prepared themselves to march, by classes, 

188 



along the dusty road to the scene of action fifteen miles Reminiscences 
away. The sun waxed hot as the day wore on, and of Mr. Webster 
the march was a weary one ; but, in accordance with 
the spirit of the time, there were plenty of refreshments 
and h ird cider in abundance proffered us by the hospit- 
able inhabitants on the route — for those were the days 
when "log cabin and hard cider'' was the party cry. I 
do not know how the faculty and the honored head of 
the College would regard it now, but it was then deemed 
the patriotic and proper thing to imbibe freely of that 
beverage, in order to show our loyalty to the presidential 
candidate. 

As to the speech — well I must confess that the 
majority of us were too weary and exhausted by the long 
march, and its unwonted accompaniments, to have given • 
such heed to it as we ought. As I recall it, it was a 
masterly exposition of the principles which pervaded 
and governed the party in whose interest it was pro- 
nounced. 

Mr. Everett has said, in his biographical memoir, 
that, during this canvass of 1840 — which he designates 
as tlie most strenuous ever witnessed in the United 
States, — Mr. Webster gave himself up for months to 
what might literally be called the arduous labors of the 

field Not only in Massachusetts and in New 

Hampshire, but in distant places, ranging from Albany 
to Richmond, his voice of encouragement and exhorta- 
tion was heard. 

I have sought in vain for any written or printed 
record of this speech, and of the many others spoken by 
Mr. Webster during that campaign, but have failed to 
find them ; and I doubt if they were ever reported by 

189 



Reminiscences the press. But, whatever may have been the scope and 
of Mr. Webster substance of this particular sp;;ech, I shall never foro^et 
the impression made upon me, as I saw and felt, for the 
first time, the mighty presence of the man. 

No one, in signifying the speeches of Mr. Webster, 
can fail to allude to his great argument in reply to 
Hayne, made in the United vStates Senate in 1830, 
wherein he darkly prophesied the approach of the irre- 
pressible conflict which, thirty years later, involved the 
country in Civil War. 

I was not old enough then, if vou can credit the 
assertion, to have taken in understandingly the scope and 
power of that memorable speech, if I had been present 
at its delivery, which I was not. 

I well remember that my honored father, who was 
a friend and ardent admirer of Mr. Webster, once said to 
me, in one of my college vacations, "I\Iy boy, it has 
been my custom in every return of the anniversary of 
that speech, to take down my copy of the National In- 
telligencer^ which contains it, and read it through from 
beginning to end, and I advise vou to do the same as 
long as you live." I regret to say that, in this as in so 
many other instances, I have failed to follow his wise 
counsel. 

I may be permitted to relate here an incident that 
befell me personally, having some relation to that 
speech. When in Charleston, S. C, some twelve or 
fifteen years ago, I visited the Ancient Church of St. 
Michael, in that city, and, falling in with the venerable 
sexton, who had been connected with the church in 
that capacity for half a century and more, and who 
seemed to be a part of the structure itself, I strolled out 

190 



under his guidance, into the adjacent churchyard. Reminiscences 
While wandering about among the old graves, my eye o^ Mr. Webster 
rested on a tomb bearing the inscription, 
" Robert Y. Hayne," 
with the date of his birth and death. Being struck by 
the fact that he died at an age when he might be sup- 
posed to be in the full possession of his powers, I in- 
quired of my cicerone the cause of his comparatively 
early death. Drawing himself up, and looking me full 
in the face, he replied, 

"He died of Webster's speech, sir." 
Another opportunity I had of hearing Mr. Webster 
at his best, was at the dinner given to him by the Asso- 
ciation of the Sons of New Hampshire resident in 
Massachusetts, in November, 1849. This took place in 
the large hall over the Fitchburg R. R. depot in Bos- 
ton. The vast auditorium was crowded to its utmost 
capacity. Mr. Webster, who was president of the As- 
sociation, presided also at the feast. I happened to be 
one of the marshals on that occasion, and my place 
was on the floor immediately in front of the speaker. 
Mr. Webster made two speeches during the evening, one 
of which has been termed his Kossuth Speech^ wherein 
he arraigned, in scathing words, the then Emperor of 
Russia for his demand on the Sultan of Turkey that the 
noble Kossuth and his companions be delivered up to be 
dealt with at his pleasure. 

Those who heard him will never forget those burn- 
ing words, when, rising to the full height of his majes- 
tic personality, he said, "Gentlemen, there is something 
on earth greater than arbitrary or despotic powers. The 
lightning has its power and the whirlwind has its power, 

191 



Reminiscences and the earthquake has its power ; but there is some- 
of Mr. Webster thing among men more capable of shaking despotic 
thrones than lightning, whirlwind, or earthquake, and 
that is the aroused and excited indignation of the whole 
civilized world. The Emperor of Russia," he con- 
tinued, "is the supreme lawgiver in his own realms, 
and, for aught I know, he is the executor of that law, 
also. But, thanks be to God, he is not the supreme 
lawgiver and executor of national law, and every offence 
against that is an offence against the rights of the civil- 
ized world." 

The effect of this impassioned outburst of eloquence 
was overwhelming. The whole vast audience rose to 
its feet as one man, and the acclamations and ap- 
plause which followed, loud and long-continued, seemed 
as though it would raise the very roof of the building. 

As to the famous Seventh of March Speech, so- 
called, I did not bear it, but I have read it many times, 
and have studied it attentively, and I, for one, do not 
see how ]Mr. Webster could consistently with the whole 
course and conduct of his life, have done otherwise than 
take just the stand he then did. Commenting on that 
important speech, an eminent authority has justly said, 
"It is believed that, by the majority of patriotic and 
reflecting citizens in every part of the United States it 
has been regarded as holding out a basis for the adjust- 
ment of controversies which had already gone far to 
dissolve the Union, and could not much farther be pur- 
sued without producing that result." Mr. Webster saw 
the difHcullies incident to the step he had adopted, and 
knew full well the risk to his political fortunes which 
he incurred by his utterances, but he believed that, 

t92 



unless some such step was taken in the North, the sep- Reminiscences 
aration of the States was inevitable. What he then of Mr. Webster 
foresaw, many of those here present have lived to experi- 
ence and to know. 

In his speech at his reception on Boston Common 
in the summer of 1852, in evident allusion to his 
Seventh of March Speech, which has caused so much 
discussion, and dissension, and contention, both among 
his friends and his enemies, Mr. Webster uttered these 
memorable words, "My manner of political life is known 
to you all ... I leave it to my country and to the world 
whether it will or will not stand the test of time and 
truth." This was spoken on the ninth day of July, 1852, 
and, so far as Lknow, it was the last utterance he ever 
made in public. A little more than three months after- 
wards he passed away. It was my melancholy privi- 
lege, at the head of a thousand of the Sons of New 
Hampshire, to join in the funeral march of that vast 
concourse of his fellow citizens of the city of Boston, 
which thronged its streets and crowded its thoroughfares, 
to manifest their grief and sorrow at his death. 

Once before, in the century which has just closed, I 
have been permitted to participate in a great centennial 
celebration of our beloved Alma Mater. I allude, of 
course, to the hundredth anniversary of the founding of 
the College; and I am one of the very few of the sur- 
vivors of those who were gathered on the platform on 
that memorable occasion. I am now nearing the time 
when, in the course of Nature, I may expect to go 
down into my not unwelcome grave ; but I thank God 
that I am spared to behold the rising sun of this auspi- 
cious day, on which the head of our most distinguished 

J93 



Reminiscences alumnus, and g^reatest among the vSons of New Hamp- 
of Mr. Webster shire, is encircled with the halo of a hundred years. It 
is a day never to be forgotten in the annals of the Col- 
lege ; and when that corner-stone, which has just been 
laid with so much pomp and ceremony, and the impos- 
ing structure which is to be reared upon it, shall have 
crumbled to dust, the memory of this first centennial 
anniversary of the graduation of our illustrious brother 
will still be green. — The light of this day shall shine 
along the pathway of the ages, so long as time en- 
dures. 

The Chairman : There is another alumnus, I 
hope, here present to-day, who, I know, is full of in- 
formation about Mr. Webster, who has been a life- 
long admirer of him, and who has heard and seen him 
many times. If Mr. Senter, of the class of '48, is in 
the Chapel, will he be kind enough to come to the plat- 
form? 

The ReJ^erend Oramel Sie'hens Senter, '48, 

I could wish, dear brethren and alumni, and invited 
guests, that I had come before you in a very different 
state of health. It was very doubtful whether I could 
come at all, but the attraction was so great once more 
to meet friends of Dartmouth College on the old camp- 
ing ground, that my physician said, "I think you can 
go. It may do you good." 

My first view of !Mr. Webster was in 1840 at the 
convention that my friend presiding refers to. I formed 
a very different opinion of Mr. Webster's address at that 
time. It was a cool day in the last of September or the 
early days of October, and he kept his hat on. Almost 
anything was dignified in Mr. Webster, even the big 

194 



brass buttons and tlie hat and buff trousers, but you Remlntscences 
remember it is not every man that can be a Webster, of Mr. Webster 
He made very few gestures on that occasion. He made 
a plain, cogent, logical statement of the principles and 
policy of the great Whig party. A nobler party never 
existed in this country ; it had in it the brightest minds 
and the best men that America ever produced ; it was 
then in its glory. Mr. Webster first stated the princi- 
ples of the party clearly, and then referred to the 
Democratic party, and Silas Wright's great feat at 
Watertown. I remember it as if it were yesterday, as 
the best authority in regard to the real principles of the 
Democratic party. 

Mr. Webster was not a man that wasted powder on 
any occasion. He suited the charge to the game before 
him. It was only on great and exciting occasions like 
the Dartmouth Case, and in the reply to Hayne that he 
was wrought up to so high a pitch as to indulge in 
flights of oratory ; but when he did rise, it was like the 
crest of the wave; you could no more check it than you 
could check the rising tide in the ocean. 

The next time I saw him was in 1843, I think here 
in Hanover. There were Webster, Choate, Chase, 
Amos Kendall, and I think Thaddeus Stevens, while 
various distinguished gentlemen who were not graduates 
were invited. I had not entered college then, for I was a 
sub-freshman, expecting to be a freshman at some time. 
I said to my companion, "I wish to go and get a look at 
Daniel Webster"; I had heard him called the Godlike 
Daniel, and I wanted to see whether his looks warranted 
such a designation, and so we went and there we sat. 
I shall never forget it. There was Choate with his 



'to 

J95 



Reminiscences raven black hair and stoop shoulders and eyes that were 
of Mr. Webster rather dim, when they looked as if they were dim with 
thought and genius, shades of grand personal appear- 
ance and stately head, almost equal to any man's except 
Webster's; Woodbury, a fine looking man; George P. 
Marsh, a man of fine personal physique and good bear- 
ing. Then presently there came along a large man, 
not very corpulent, but of full habit, with deep chest 
and broad shoulders and with a high forehead and with 
such eyes as I have said no man ever had but Daniel 
Webster. And his step was so firm though dignified, 
without any affectation M'ith it, that it seemed to me 
that the earth was not solid enough for that solid man. 
I turned to my companion and said, "This is the only 
man in this vast throng containing so much talent and 
all that is brilliant and honored bv the College and the 
country ; this must be Daniel Webster." 

I have felt, gentlemen, that all we could do in re- 
gard to reminiscences is just to gather up a few frag- 
ments. And certaiuly nothing is unimportant pertainiug 
to the great statesman, orator, and forensic and dip- 
lomatic reasoner, one who possessed, perhaps, the noblest 
body of all that were ever created on this continent or 
any other. How much more truly, then, may it be 
said of him than of the man described by Sheridan, of 
whom it was said, "God broke the die, the mould, in 
moulding Webster." No wonder that the citizens of 
Boston called him the Godlike Dnniel. I heard him at 
another time referred to by Mr. Harvey when Faneuil 
Hall that had witnessed his most eloquent and most 
patriotic expressions in favor of liberty, when Faneuil 
Hall was denied him. The city authorities were afraid 

\96 



that some of those rabid and raving abolitionists would Reminiscences 

have it, and so they refused it to Daniel Webster, but of Mr. Webster 

the people became so aroused and raised such a hubbub 

around the ears of the authorities that they went to Mr. 

Webster and ate humble pie ; and he made them eat it, 

large doses of it. How unlike Mr. Webster, but he 

made them eat large doses of it, and then, when they 

offered him the hall, he curtly declined and stood back on 

his dignity. Harvey tells us all that, but he does not 

give us the sequel. He says that Mr. Webster stopped 

several days at the Revere House. So he did. There 

he made a very interesting address, which I heard. 

The people somehow got word of it. I don't know 

how they were notified of it, but an immense throng 

filled Bowdoin Square so that they had to have a large 

squad of police there in order to keep order. They 

had erected a temporary balcony at the corner of the 

Revere House. This was on the twenty-second of 

April, 1851, just one year and a month, or a little more, 

after the Seventh of INIarch Speech. Of course we all 

expected to hear some allusion to that, but we went 

away entirely disappointed on that point. Mr. Webster 

was in a happy mood. I took down his exordium, 

about a dozen lines, and, perhaps, I can read them : 

"Fellow citizens, as I come before you on this bright 

and beautiful morning, with the glorious sun gilding 

with his first rays our steeples and housetops and clothing 

the earth with warmth and cheerfulness, I feel very 

happy, and if all before me are as happy as the speaker 

there must be a great amount of happiness in this vast 

concourse of people. ' ' 



197 



Reminiscences Now I shall refer to an incident connected with 

of Mr. Webster the famous silver vase. In 1835, Mr. Webster made 
reply to Hayne. He had also made another very im- 
portant speech in reply to the Calhoun doctrine in 1833, 
and various other speeches, on the banking question and 
other topics. Thus it was that the citizens of Boston 
thought it would be very desirable to call Webster out to 
make a speech on those topics. They went ahead and 
gathered funds, no man being allowed to contribute more 
than one dollar towards the purchase of a silver vase to be 
presented to ^Ir. Webster. After having been so secured 
it was presented to him with interesting formalities. A 
Mr. Gray made the speech, or address of presentation, and 
Mr. Webster replied to it very much at length. Later 
the original donors made a gift of that vase to the 
Library authorities in Boston on the express condition 
that it should be kept where the greatest possible num- 
ber of people could see it, and it was placed in the old 
Public Library where it could be seen. I recently 
employed a young man to look the matter up, and it 
turns out that the vase has been taken to the new 
Boston Public Library, where it is hidden away 
where nobody can see it. 

Now, I hope before this meeting breaks up that it 
will be resolved that it is the intent and desire of the 
Dartmouth alumni that that vase shall be brought out 
of its hiding place and that it shall be suitably inscribed 
and placed in some public position, where it may be seen, 
for the admiration of the citizens. There is one 
comical incident connected with this matter which I 
will relate. When it was given to \Vebster, there was 
an old resident of my native village, Thetford, a first- 

198 



class business man who grew rich at his trade as a tanner. Reminiscences 

He came into the village store one day and announced of Mr, Webster 

with great wonder and emphasis, "What do you think; 

the citizens of Boston have presented Daniel Webster 

with a silver vest!" Somebody in the crowd said, 

"Why, Mr. Ansey, aren't you mistaken? Isn't it a 

silver vase?" "No doubt," he said, "it must be that. 

I have no doubt I was mistaken. ' ' This same gentleman 

came into the store and said that he read that Harry 

Clay and Theodore Frelinghunter had been nominated. 

I have said that some resolution should be passed 
that it is the desire and opinion of the assembly of the 
alumni of Dartmouth College that that interesting relic 
and historic article shall be brought out and placed in 
some conspicuous position where all the citizens of Bos- 
ton and all the friends of that library can have the best 
possible opportunity of seeing it, and of seeing the in- 
scriptions which are upon it. I thank you, gentlemen, 
for the attention you have given to the very broken 
remarks I have made. I will not detain you longer. 

The Chairman : Following down in the order of 
seniority, I have here on my list the name of a brother 
classmate. Dr. Foster, of '49. I know that Dr. Foster 
has at least one reminiscence of Daniel Webster, for he 
has often recounted it to me. It was of the, I will not 
say impulse, I don't know that I ought to say inspira- 
tion, but it was something very positive that he once 
derived from Daniel Webster's boot. I will ask Dr. 
Foster, of the class of '49, if he can give us any experi- 
ence or reminiscence. 



t99 



Reminiscences 7he ^e^erend Da^is Foster, D. D., '49. 

of Mr, Webster b.^^i^.^^ ^^^ Friends : 

I have heard specimens of moving oratory, but I 
think nothing has been quite so moving as the incident 
which I will relate to you. In 1847, Daniel Webster 
came up to Lebanon and gave an address at the opening 
of the Northern Railroad. "We colleg-e bovs went down 
to hear him as was very natural. We sat on the plat- 
form, a half dozen of us, with our legs hanging over — a 
not very dignified attitude. There was a great con- 
gregation present, four or five thousand people, and 
when j\Ir. Webster came forward to speak, we whispered 
among ourselves, "Now, we will touch some part of his 
clothing, or we w^ll touch something connected with 
Webster." And we put our hands upon his boots. 
They were coarse, cowhide boots, such as men wore in 
those times, not fancy slippers, but simply cowhide boots. 
Among our number was a i\Ir. Doe. Well, the 
Doe happened to be thin leavened at that time. It had 
not risen, but the touch of I\Ir. Webster's cowhide boot 
proved very efficacious in the life of Chief Justice Doe 
of New Hampshire. ]\Ir. Doe began to rise. He con- 
tinued to rise and forty years after, when we met at our 
fortieth anniversary, ]\Ir. Doe was, perhaps, in some re- 
spects the equal of any citizen of New Hampshire as a 
jurist and as a judge. His name had been mentioned 
for the office of Chief Justice of the United States. He 
was a man of mark. Mr. Doe had risen and he made a 
full sized loaf of bread. I said to Judge Doe, "Mr. 
Doe, it did you more good than all the rest of us to 
touch I\Ir. Webster's boot." The rest of us never at- 
tained eminence. We went on doing a common sort of 
200 



work, and we had good men in the class. My friend, Reminiscences 
the president of this occasion, did rise. But we, none of Mr. Webster 
of us, rose as Mr. Doe rose. And none of us have been 
harmed by it, but it did Doe a wonderful amount of 
good. From that time he began to rise and continued 
to rise as long as he lived. 

The Chairman : We have often been told the power- 
ful incentive to action there was in an animated pair of 
boots. Especially if they were, as my old classmate 
says those boots were, cowhide boots. I can only re- 
gret that I was not on that platform. I got no touch of 
them myself. I have been advised that Mr. Joseph 
Story of Boston, a nephew of Chief Justice Story, is 
here, and remembers some things personally about Mr. 
Webster. We shall be very glad to hear from Mr. 
Story. 

cMr. Joseph Story, 

The Chairman has asked me the year of my class. 
I have been in the habit of visiting Hanover, and 
happening to be in Hanover I came here to-day. I 
came to Hanover to visit a friend of mine and to enjoy 
the two days of celebration in honor of this distinguished 
American. I have been asked a number of times dur- 
ing my visit if I were connected with Dartmouth Col- 
lege, or a graduate of Dartmouth. " Well," I said 
jocosely, " yes, I have been through Dartmouth. " 
I took the opportunity one day to go into the 
front door of, it seems to me, this building and go 
through the rooms of the College and out of the rear 
door, so that I may say that I have been through Dart- 
mouth College and save any further explanations. I do 

20t 



Reminiscences not feel that I have any place here, friends, only as 
of Mr. Webster one of the humble American citizens who have deliehted 
to know that Daniel Webster, so distinguished through- 
out the world, was an American citizen. 

Reference has been made to the Whig party. I 
was cradled in that party. ]\Iy childhood was rocked in 
the Whig cradle, and of course I began to live hearing 
of Daniel Webster, and in quite a number of days in 
my childhood, his name, his labors, and his fame were 
called to my attention. As a little boy I remember the 
scenes of the courtroom in the case of the murder of Jo- 
seph Pike of Salem. He was a connection. The case 
was much talked of in the family. I remember the ex- 
citing circumstances, how the vigilance committee was 
appointed, and how they labored month after month, 
and month after month without finding any clue to 
that terrible tragedy, but at last, I think it was after 
about two years, it came by accident, revealed by one who 
had been offered a sum of money two years before to 
keep to himself his knowledge. He wrote to one of the 
Knox boys a letter asking them — the boys who hired 
Crowninshield to commit that murder — that they should 
send him money, two or three hundred dollars that had 
been offered him if he would keep closed iips. It went 
to Salem to the son. The son had the same name as 
his father, and he turned it over to his father who was 
one of the vigilance committee. And that father felt 
that it was his duty to the people of Salem that he should 
give to them that letter. 

The results you know, and the words of Webster 
in that trial, tracing up from the time the murderer en- 
tered the house until the transaction was closed. But 

202 



the orator of the day omitted the statement that during Reminiscences 
the trial Crowninshield committed suicide in prison, of Mr. Webster 
and that Mr. Webster, referring to it, uttered that sen- 
tence that has been so well known in legal quotations — 
" There is no escape but suicide, and suicide is con- 
fession." 

There is one thing that I wish I had with me, a 
little paper, a poem written by Mr. Webster in his 
younger life over the death of a dear young son of great 
promise. I haven't it, but it shows that touch of 
nature, that not only as a great man he mingled with 
great men, not only as a great man he knew no per- 
son too humble for his association ; but it brought 
out from a father's heart, from the heart of that great 
man, an utterance in language so simple and tender 
that I know every mother and every father present here 
to-day would feel that his lament over the loss of a son 
revealed the same tenderness that they felt when they 
laid a little boy of promise, upon whom they had set 
their hearts, away in the grave. 

During the times that I have been here it has been 
a pleasure to visit your art gallery. Reference has been 
made a number of times to the reply of Webster to 
Hayne. That scene is delineated upon canvas, as you 
know, in Faneuil Hall in Boston, and ]\Ir. Webster 
stands there, the prominent person upon the canvas. 
If any of you wish to know how Mr. Webster looked 
when he spoke, aside from anything that has been said 
here, go for yourselves into that gallery and look there 
at the statue by Thomas Ball, in my judgment the best 
of any that I have ever seen (his bust and his statue re- 
veal the lineaments of Mr. Webster as well as they can 

203 



Reminiscences tje portrayed in bronze or clay or plaster) , and then im- 
of Mr. Webster agine him standing up in the Senate of the United 
States. Look at that plaster, clothe it with raiment, 
put into the face the color of the skin and to the eyes, 
those great lustrous eyes, the elements of life, and then 
with ears that shall be quick to hear unheard sounds, 
listen to his voice and imagine that you were there, and 
you have a picture of Mr. Webster as the orator, the 
senator, the great man among his fellows. 

Did he want to be President ? I know something 
about the campaign, though I was small at the time. 
Did he want to be President ? Suppose he did. Was n't 
he fit for it ? Was there ever a man in our country' that 
had stood before our people, advocating the questions 
that should bring to our country the highest type of 
civilization, of industrial interest, of business prosperity 
and happiness for the people ; was there ever any one 
who had ever done it to a greater extent than j\Ir. Web- 
ster? Well might he wish it. Well might he have 
wished the Presidency. Men wish to be selectmen, to 
be common councillors, men wish to be aldermen, or 
representatives, or senators. He was certainly gifted for 
the Presidency, and I am thankful to-day that the gentle- 
man who has spoken so eloquently to us, the Honorable 
Mr. McCall, has given tons such an oration connected 
with the life of ]\Ir. Webster and the elements in his 
character. Pie covered the same ground that others had 
covered, but he went a step further, and turned over 
some of the other pages that had not been so much 
referred to. I was glad that he did it, because I think 
that he did it well. I know how bitterly the people 
felt toward ]\Ir. Webster — many who had been his 

204 



friends— when he delivered that March address. Bnt 1 Reminiscences 

had heard from some of his associates what the feeling of of Mr. Webster 

Webster was when he delivered that speech, he who had 

been the exponnder and the defender of the Constitution 

of the United States, whose sentiments had always been 

noble, who was the idol, worshiped by a great and 

prosperous party. 

I believe that Mr. Webster felt as his friends claimed 
for him when he said that before them stood the picture 
of a country rent asunder, one nation at the south, 
another nation at the north, with no prospect of union; 
that rather than to carry out any particular policy at 
that time he would rather bide for the time to come 
when those questions that had been troublesome should 
be settled without bloodshed, without war, without a 
broken and disunited country. All this, I think, has 
been proved since that time. Ah, from the very ram- 
parts of Heaven, that man who stood and spoke as he 
did, with a prophet's eye looking into the future saw 
signs at that time when the discussion of those questions 
were uppermost ; he saw signs that we were then on the 
verge of one of the bloodiest wars the world had ever 
seen or ever would see, when our sons and fathers and 
brothers, north and south, should mingle their blood 
with the mother Earth. 

It was a prophetic eye, I believe, and I believe it 
was to guard against that fate that Mr. Webster spoke 
with prophetic thought, fearing the things that did come 
to us. But I thank God that that man who has done so 
much for his country and must have had his heart 
grieved, if they are conscious in that other world of the 
things that transpire here in this world, is now looking 

205 



Reminiscences down upon the nation that he loved, upon the country 
of Mr. Webster for which he labored, this chain of states from the Gulf 
to the line of Canada united in an equal bond. 

It is not proper for me to occupy your time at this 
hour with my feelings about i\Ir. Webster, and I thank 
every man who has said a kind word for him, and I 
thank you that you have permitted me to say just these 
few words, coming as I did without the least intention' 
of taking any part in any celebration except to rejoice 
with you. It has been a grand time. Accept my 
thanks. 

The Chairman : The hour grows late, much more 
time than we have to spare could be given to recalling 
these interesting reminiscences, but we cannot agree to 
dissolve this meeting till we have heard of the last lov- 
ing tribute paid the dead statesman by his friends and 
neighbors. A brother alumnus is present who was one 
of the committee of his class to attend Daniel Webster's 
funeral — ]Mr. Runnels of '53 will tell us his experiences 
in the performance of that duty — a duty which a half 
century ago this College thought might be the last 
tribute of respect it w^ould ever have opportunity to pay 
to the memory of her greatest son. 

The Reverend SMoses Thurston Runnels, A. cM.^ '53. 
Fellow Alumni and Friends of Dartmouth : 

I shall take scarcely more than five minutes of 
your valuable time this afternoon. I trust you will ex- 
cuse the egotism of an old alumnus who finds himself 
on this occasion one among the very few who were stu- 
dents in the College when our innnortal Webster 
breathed his last, and the only one among the students 

206 



here present who was permitted to attend his funeral at Reminiscences 
Marshfield. of Mr. Webster 

I well recall the impression which the not unex- 
pected intelligence of Mr. Webster's death made upon 
us as a body of students. We had been having a very 
heated political campaign for several weeks before that, 
of Scott versus Pierce in 1852. I remember having 
climbed the lightning rod to the top of the dome of 
Dartmouth Hall and to have held my classmate Burnett 
while standing up on my shoulders so that he might 
fasten our Scott flag nearer to the weather vane than 
the Pierce flag had previously been raised. ]\Iany were 
the political gatherings and the political speeches which 
we had been hearing or trying to make, but when 
the news of Mr. Webster's demise came to us on or 
soon after the twenty-fourth day of October, a sudden 
hush, a deep solemnity fell upon us like a pall. 

Politics were entirely dropped. The students met 
as a body in this Chapel. Our revered teachers with 
the venerable Dr. Lord at their head — all now gone 
to their reward — spoke to us fitting words, after which 
two delegates from each class were chosen to attend the 
funeral of the departed statesman. Our friend, Alpheus 
Benning Crosby, the genial Dr. Ben of after years, was 
selected with me to represent the senior class. The 
late lamented Dr. Henry R. Hazen was a delegate from 
the class of 1854, and my impression is, though I 
am not quite certain, that Walbridge A. Field, afterwards 
Chief Justice of ^Massachusetts, and John M. Chamber- 
lain, a clergyman of later years in j\Iinnesota, represented 
the class of 1855. 



207 



Reminisrenccs Before this I had been a very studious youth. Not 

of Mr, Webster a mark for three years had been set against my name on 
the monitor's bills, and I was so anxious not to break 
the record that I hesitated about accepting the appoint- 
ment. But my excellent uncle, Dr. Albert Smith, of 
the medical faculty, charged me by all means to do so. 
Said he, " You will hereafter look back upon it as one 
of the highest honors of your life to have attended the 
funeral of j\Ir. Webster." I therefore donned my first 
black stovepipe hat, the only one I have ever worn, and 
proceeded to Alarshfield with the rest. 

But who can adequately picture that scene ! The 
people of IMassachusetts poured into IMarshfield by thou- 
sands, not only from his own Congressional district, 
which we are told once gave Mr. Webster every vote 
but one to return him to Congress, but from all parts of 
the state and from other portions of New England. 
Steamboats were carried up from Boston to Duxbury, 
and other adjacent harbors. Train after train went up 
to the nearest station on the Old Colony Railroad while 
all the old neighbors of INIr. Webster, the sturdy farmers 
of Marshiield and its vicinitv, in whose agricultural 
affairs he had taken so deep an interest, were there in a 
body. Several of these were his chosen bearers, and I 
remember to have seen them sitting with tearful eyes 
beside his bier. 

Mr. Webster's body was dressed in his citizen's 
suit just as he used to appear in Boston, and was laid 
upon a raised open casket. The last picture we saw 
upon the screen last evening well answered to his face 
as he appeared in death, only with closed eyes, while 
the massive forehead and deeply arched eyebrows made 

208 



us all feel it was the most magnificent face and form Reminiscences 

that we had ever gazed upon in the embrace of death, of Mr. Webster 

I had never seen Mr. Webster in life, but his mortal 

part in death left an impression upon my mind which 

only the glories of eternity can efface. For an hour or 

two the masses filed by to take their lastlingeringlookof 

that Godlike form and countenance. The Reverend Mr. 

Alden, then the young pastor of the Marsh field church, 

by Mr. Webster's request, conducted the services and 

was the only one who spoke at his funeral. The pro- 

ces3ion which followed his remains was so large that it 

seemed necessary to take quite a circuitous route to the 

place of burial . Sadly we marched along to the music of 

that grand requiem of Beethoven, which has since borne 

the name of "Webster's Funeral March." As we were 

thus passing to the tomb, I well remember that the 

sun for the first time on that day shone out brightly 

from the dull and mournful clouds which had hung 

over us during the preceding hours. 

Behind me in the procession was an elderly gentle- 
man who quoted, as we slowly wended our way, a para- 
graph of Webster's phillipic against Hayne. He 
further said that he himself was present in the Senate 
chamber when that speech was delivered, and that the 
sun then beamed into the chamber lighting up the very 
spot where IMr. Webster was standing near the close of 
that address, as he uttered those undying words : 
" When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last 
time, the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on 
the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious 
Union ; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on 
a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched it may be, in 

209 



Reminiscences fraternal blood ! Let their last feeble and lingering 
ot Mr. Webster glance, rather, behold the gorgeous ensign of the re- 
public bearing not these words of delu- 
sion and folly, ' Liberty first and Union afterwards' ; 

but that other sentiment, dear to everj-- 

true American heart — 'Liberty and Union, now and 
forever, one and inseparable ! ' " 

The Chairman : Gentlemen, we have now per- 
formed the last duty, paid the last tribute that the 
alumni of Dartmouth College can at this time present 
to the memory of their great fellow alumnus. What 
shall follow this evening will be rather in the lieht of 
hilarity and festivity proper to any centennial celebra- 
tion, but this meeting for reminiscence this afternoon 
was forced to take on somewhat of a more sober charac- 
ter. I congratulate you and myself that we have heard 
so much that has been of interest and that this descrip- 
tion of his final laying away has been so graphically 
told. May the recollections of this occasion be prized 
in all the future which is before us. Our duty is now 
ended : as we go hence may we say of our illustrious 
Webster with bowed heads and with loving, reverent 
hearts, ' ' Rcquiesca t in pace. ' ' 



210 



6>6c E^xercises of 
Wednesday E^vening 



Program. 

The Centennial dosed with a banquet, followed by speeches 
from distinguished alumni and guests of the College. The 
new and stately dining hall in College Hall was at 
this time put to its first public use. At 7:30 o*cIock the hall 
was filled to its utmost capacity with trustees, faculty, 
alumni, and guests of the College. The gallery was re- 
served for ladies in attendance at the Centennial. 
Banquet. 

Following the banquet the President of the College intro- 
duced the guests of the evening : 

His Excellency the Governor of New Hampshire. 

Edwin "Webster Sanborn, Esquire, *78. 

Professor Francis Brown, LL. D., *70. 

The Honorable David Cross, LL, D., *4I. 

The Honorable William Everett, LL. D. 

The Reverend Edward Everett Hale, LL. D. 

The Honorable George Frisbie Hoar, LL. D. 

Chief Justice Melville Weston Fuller, LL. D. 




THe Webster Centeniiial Banquet. 

HE dining hall was hung with portraits. At the 
head of the hall were those of Mr. Webster, 
with one exception in possession of the College; 
the " Black Dan" picture, painted by Francis iVlexander 
and presented to the College by Dr. G. C. Shattuck, 
1803 ; the painting by T. A. Lawson, the gift of John 
Aiken, Esquire, 18 14, and others ; the Ames portrait, 

213 



The painted by Joseph Ames and presented to the College 

Centennial by Dr. J. B. Upham, 1842 ; the IMarshfield portrait, 

Banquet painted at Marshfield in 1848 by Emer}- Seaman and 

presented to the College by Lewis G. Farmer, Esqnire, 

1872 ; and the portrait by Gilbert Stnart, loaned by the 

Honorable George Fred Williams, 1872. 

On either side were portraits of some of the counsel 
who were associated with ]\Ir, Webster in the Dartmouth 
College Case : Jeremiah Smith and Jeremiah Mason, 
who appeared with Air. Webster before the State Court ; 
Levi Woodbury, of the New Hampshire Bench ; Joseph 
Hopkinson, who, with ]\Ir. Webster, carried tlie case 
before the Supreme Court of the United States ; and 
Ichabod Bartlett of the opposing counsel. 

There were also hung about the room portraits of 
the founder, early presidents, distinguished graduates, 
and benefactors of the College. Among these there was 
a draped portrait of the Honorable Frank Palmer 
Goulding of the class of 1863, who was to have spoken 
at the banquet, but who died only a few days before the 
Centennial. 

When the procession had entered and all had been 
seated under the direction of the INIarshal, divine 
blessing was asked by Professor Francis Brown, LL. 
D., '70. During the banquet the College Orchestra 
furnished music. The speaking which followed was 
interspersed with selections by the Glee Club. 

At the close of the banquet Colonel Darling called 
the assembly to order with a bell, which he stated had 
been owned and used by Mr. Webster in his home in 
Franklin. He also announced that through the courtesy 
of the Boston and Maine railroad the special train for 

2H 



Boston would be lield until one hour after tlie close of The 
the exercises. Centennial 

Banquet 




Introductory Words of tKe Presid- 
ing Officer. 

Brethren of the Alumni, Ladies and Gentlemen, and 
our honored Guests : — 

REGRET that my opening word must be a word 
of apology. It was far from my intention to 
preside at this dinner. At the very outset an in- 
vitation was extended to the Honorable Alfred Russell 
of the class of 1850, to serv^e as toastmaster, in recogni- 
tion of his eminent fitness for this service. He had ac- 
cepted the invitation, and had confidently expected to 
be with us until within a few days. A special session 
of the Supreme Court of Michigan, fixed for this very 
date, detains him at Detroit. As it falls to me to play 
the part of host for the College throughout this Centen- 
nial occasion I have been impressed by the committee of 
arrangements into Mr. Russell's place. It is not my 
duty to make his speech ; only to discharge the more 
formal functions of his office. 

There is but one word which I can speak in my 
capacity as host with perhaps greater fitness than Mr. 
Russell, the simple word of welcome. I bid you wel- 
come, brethren of the alumni, you who have come 
hither in your gratitude and in your pride. I welcome 
you to the full enjoyment of your honorable and inspir- 
ing fellowship. I welcome you also to the high task of 
making the College more worthy of the man and of the 
event which we celebrate. I bid you welcome, repre- 

215 



The sentatives of the state of New Hampshire, and you 
President our neighbors of the state of Massachusetts, who are 
of the with us on this occasion by virtue of a common in- 
College heritance and of a common affection. I bid you wel- 
come, our most distinguished guests, who have 
graciously counted it an honor to join with us in this re- 
vival of the fame of Mr. Webster. 

I have before me letters of regret from man\- whose 
presence would have added greatly to the enjoyment and 
to the distinction of this gathering. The following I 
will read in full or in part : 

ESKADALE, BeAULY, SCOTLAND, Aug. 27. 1901. 

Lord Dartmouth regrets extremely that important engagements 
in England will prevent his visiting America this autumn. He must 
therefore regretfully decline the invitation of the President and Trus- 
tees of Dartmouth College to attend the celebration of the Centennial 
Anniversary of the graduation of Daniel Webster, a ceremony which 
had it been possible, he would much have liked to witness. 

Wood Lee, Virginia Water, September 2, 1901. 
Dear Mr. President : — 

I regret very much that I shall be unable to avail myself of the 
invitation extended by the President and Trustees of Dartmouth 
College to be present on so interesting an occasion as that of the cele- 
bration of the Centennial Anniversary of the graduation of Daniel 
Webster. 

With renewed regrets, and all good wishes for the continued suc- 
cess and usefulness of the College, Believe me, 

Very faithfully yours, 

Levi P. IMorton. 
The President of Dartmouth College. 

Newbury, N. H.. August 3. looi. 
Dear Dr. Tucker : — 

I have received your kind letter of the 30th of July and I am, of 
course, deeply sensible of the compliment involved in the invitation. 
It is however out of my power to avail myself of your courtesy. I am 
engaged at the request of the President in keeping up the current 

216 



business of the State Department, which I can do by dividing my The 
time between this place and Washington. But 1 am unable to make President 
any engagements for any other purpose. ^^ ^^^ 

I am most grateful to you for your kind letter and wish that I 
could answer diiferently. ^^ ^2 

Yours faitlifully, 

John Hay. 

North Conway, N. H., September 5, 1901. 
The President and Faculty of Dartmouth College. 
Gentlemen : — 

To accept your courteous invitation to join in the September fes- 
tivities of our venerable and distinguished College would give me 
very real gratification. And I would certainly be with you then were 
I in New England. But, unfortunately for me, I must the last week 
in this month be well on my way to San Francisco. There I have 
throughout October, duties of a serious nature which I cannot pos- 
sibly put aside. 

I am sure that the old College will gather many of her sons ; and 
what college can rejoice in a body of alumni, at once more loyal than 
they of Dartmouth, or made up of stronger men ! Not one. 

To all who value a sound and large education, and who care that 
New Hampshire do share in all best things, the sound, prosperous 
condition of the College is a cause of much gladness. 

And with all warmest good wishes, I am, Gendemen, 
With greatest respect, Very truly yours, 

William W. Niles. 

To the President and Trustees of Dartmouth College. 
Gentlemen : — 

I have the honor to express my gratification at receiving your in- 
vitation to participate in the celebration of the Centennial Anniver- 
sary of the graduation of Daniel Webster. It would afford me the 
greatest pleasure to be with you on that occasion, did not my age and 
naturally waning strength forbid. His glorious head inspired me in 
my first work in clay, the first stroke of my chisel, afforded me the 
first success in my profession, and therefore is heartily and gratefully 
remembered by me. 

I will only add a passing thought, 

On that sad night, when he departed, 
Ere his great spirit fled : 

217 



The Three words he murmured ; then 'twas whispered, 

President ""^ '^ ^^^^■" 

of the Not so ! He's with you in your meeting, 

College ^^^ benison to give ; 

And — though you may not hear — repeating 
"I still live!" 

Respectfully and truly yours, 

Thomas Ball. 

MOXTCLAIR, N. J., Aug. 20, 1901. 

Lawrence Park, Bronxville, N. Y., September 2d. 1901. 
William Jewictt Tucker, D. D., LL. D.. 

President of Dartmouth College. 
Dear Sir : — 

My respect and affection for Dartmouth, at whose hands I 
received my first honorary- degree not conferred by my Alma Mater, 
make me always grateful for her remembrance ; and I am now hon- 
ored by the invitation of her President and Trustees to attend the cele- 
bration of the Centennial Anniversary of the graduation of Daniel 
Webster. 

It is with more than conventional regret that I find myself unable 
to visit Dartmouth upon so notable an occasion. With the great 
names of Webster, Choate, and Chase upon the roll of her graduates, 
she can indeed in Lowell's words, 
" — cling forever 

In her grand old mountain rest," 
and proudly breast the upper air. 

I am, with much respect. 

Very truly yours, 

Edmund C. Stedman. 

Harlakenden House, Cornish, August 31, 1901. 
My Dear Dr. Tucker : — 

I regret exceedingly that I shall not be able to attend the Webster 
Centennial, but I shall not be in this part of the country at the time. 
I am very much disappointed that this is the case, but I have other 
engagements of long standing which it is impossible to break. I ex- 
pect to drive to Dartmouth some time this autumn, and shall call and 
pay my respects and express my regrets to you then. Witli many 
thanks, believe me. 

Sincerely yours, 

Winston Churchill. 

218 



Letters have also been received from Chief Justice The 
Isaac Blodgett, Senators Gallinger and Burnhani, As- President 
sistant Secretary Hackett, Representative Sulloway, oi the 
the Honorable Stilson Hutchins, the Honorable John College 
D. Lyman, Ex-Senator Dawes, Judge Jeremiah Smith, 
President Lucius Tuttle, the Honorable George Fred 
Williams, Chief Justice Holmes, ex-Secretary Olney, 
Senator W. P. Dillingham, ex-Judge Hoadly and others. 

I will read the following letter which lends its own 
pathos to this occasion. All we have to show for the 
promise of this letter is an honored memory, and the 
draped picture which hangs upon the wall. 

Poland Spring House, South Poland, Me. 

Rev. W. J. Tucker, Hanover, N. H. 
Afy Dear Dr. Tucker: — 

Your invitation to speak at the banquet. September 25th, on Mr. 
Webster at the Massachusetts bar was forwarded here, and I have 
just received it. I thank you very much for the honor, and am happy 
to accept. Hoping that the celebration may be all we desire, I 
remain. 

Very sincerely yours, 

Frank P. Goulding. 

In the absence, however, of many who would have 
been with us to-night had it been possible, we have a 
princely gathering. I will not withhold your attention 
from those whose fame has brought you around these 
tables. In the letter of Mr. Russell to Judge Richardson 
explaining his absence he gave this chance definition of 
a toastmaster, "The toastmaster resembles the whet- 
stone mentioned by Horace which does no cutting it- 
self ; but brings out the sharpness of the blades of 
others." Accepting this definition I proceed at once 
to touch the edge of the blades around me. 

219 



-j-j^g And first of all I am about to present to you the 

President Governor of the State of New Hampshire. The relation 
of the ^^ ^^^^ State to the College is very different from that 
College which obtained at the time which is brought to mind 
by events which will doubtless be referred to this even- 
ing. The Dartmouth College Case bore the legal 
title, "The Trustees of Dartmouth College vs. William 
H. Woodward," but the defendant in the case was 
virtually the State of New Hampshire. It would be 
unjust, however, to recall this ancient controversy from 
the side of the College without making the frank 
acknowledgment that the College invited the interference 
of the State. As I have had occasion to say elsewhere, 
the State did not take the initiative. It was, perhaps, 
for this reason that the breach between the State and 
the College was so quickly healed after the Federal 
Court had made its decision. In the present relations 
between the State and the College no one could suspect 
that there had ever been alienation or controversy. 
Each recognizes in growing measure its obligation to 
the other, and from the side of the State no one has 
expressed with greater frankness or good will the 
present indebtedness of the State to the College than the 
honored guest whom I now present to you. His 
Excellency the Governor of New Hampshire. 



220 



SpeecK of His Excellency CHester Chester 

Bradley Jordasi, LL.D. Bradley 

Jordan 

Mr. President : — 



N 



EW Hampshire is proud that she was able to 
Sfive to the nation and the world a character so 
o^rand, an intellect so great as to win and hold 
the admiration of reading, thinking men in all lands for 
almost a century. Richly endowed by his Creator, for- 
tunate in being well born of loving, sturdy parents who 
contributed generously of themselves and of their scant 
means to the education and the culture that well sup- 
plemented his massive natural powers, Webster early 
attracted the attention of our great minds, went to the 
front rank of lawyers, diplomats, and statesmen, and for 
half a century in all those fields maintained undisputed 
primacy. And now at this centennial celebration of 
his graduation from this renowned seat of learning his 
work and his name stand forth in matchless brilliancy 
and in a glory undimmed by the flight of years. His- 
tory nowhere records greater achievements performed 
by any man in the civil walks of life than those wrought 
by this son of the old Granite State as he thought and 
toiled and wrote and spake to and among his fellow 
countrymen, unfolding to dim understanding, explain- 
ing to obtuse intellects, making plain to carping critics 
not then over loyal to our form of government, the rich- 
ness, the fullness and completeness of the Constitution, 
urging upon all the people the great necessity for adher- 
ing to all its provisions in sunshine and in tempest, in 
war and in peace. With a logic that was irresistible, a 
reasoning most convincing, a forecast so unerring as to 

221 



Chester be prophetic, with appeals eloquent with truth and loy- 
Bradley alty he did work for the constitution second to none, 

Jordan and equalled, if equalled at all, only by that of the 
great ^larshall. 

But standing here among these Judges, Senators, 
Members of Congress, Presidents and Professors of Col- 
leges, Doctors of Law, Divinity, and ^Medicine, grand 
men in every calling who have spoken and are to speak 
of him whose virtues we celebrate, in the short time 
accorded me as Chief Magistrate of Webster's native 
state, I shall not, must not, undertake to cover any con- 
siderable part of the broad field of his activities and use- 
fulness, but rather seek to speak a few words concern- 
ing what more distinctively belongs to New Hampshire. 
I realize that he was the nation's, that he was in every 
large sense an American citizen hemmed in by no state 
lines : that all our states have a right to share in his 
lustrous record, his wonderful career, and his ever in- 
creasing fame. Ours, I have said is the place of his 
birth, the home of his childhood. Ours, too, his par- 
ents, his brothers and sisters, his boyhood days, his 
early struggles in school, his college life, in which he 
gave abundant promise of the man he became. Ours 
the deep reverence for father and mother and the loyalty 
to the interests and wants of all in the old home at Salis- 
bury ; ours the all-night conference when he laid bare 
to Ezekiel his plans and purpose for sending him to 
College, and ours the tears, and the conflict, too, be- 
tween desire and apparent duty to themselves and the 
rest of the household, of that father and mother in that 
next night's conference as they discussed the question 
of mortgaging the farm to raise money to educate both 

222 



boys ; ours that brio-ht morning when the sun broke Chester 
upon that humble home and found a new radiance, a Bradley 
brighter bow of promise than its inmates had ever before Jordan 
beheld, for all had heard the words of the fond mother, — 
"Father, I guess we better trust the boys." Ours the 
inspiring example of that sublime trust in rugged, 
noble, aspiring youth, and of unsurpassed filial devotion 
and care in return ; ours the journeys of father and son 
to Exeter and to Hanover ; of son, on that May day as 
his quarter's salary was paid him, the first consider- 
able sum of money he ever earned, when with a thrill 
of joy he never before felt he set out across the country 
for Hanover and placed it all in Ezekiel's hands. 

This giant of giants, this prince of princes, this 
man who knew no superior among men as he walked 
the earth, was by his own fireside sweet and tender as a 
woman. As his children and wife bent before the storms 
of life he went deep into the valley of affliction. His 
mighty hand was soft and gentle as he laid it upon the 
wounds of suffering humanity. His great heart never 
failed to bleed at the woes and misfortunes of others. 

He kept green and warm his love for his old New 
Hampshire home and his New Hampshire friends. Every 
year he made fond pilgrimages to it and to them. He was 
pleased beyond measure to receive on his birthday 
letters from his old neighbors. In public and in 
private he told of the virtues of those from whose loins 
he sprang. He sang praises to New Hampshire's 
beautiful hills, everlasting mountains, to her lakes and 
her rivers, to the streams that in his boyhood had be- 
come so dear to him. With the elder Crawford he 
climbed our highest mountain. As he reached the top 

223 



Chester he said, — "Mt. Washington, I have come a long distance 

Bradley and toiled hard to reach your summit, and now you 

Jordan give me a cold reception. I am extremely sorry that I 

cannot stay to view this grand prospect which lies 

before me and nothing prevents but the uncomfortable 

atmosphere in which you reside." 

His address at the New Hampshire Festival at 
Boston in November, 1849, is full of affection for home 
and friends. The keynote of his oration here in Han- 
over in 1800 was love of country. In his Fourth of 
July oration at Fryeburg in 1802 he said, "The American 
Constitution is the purchase of American valor," and 
from then to the day of his death he did not cease to 
urge upon all his countrymen the danger of departing 
from its teachings. 

He loved his Alma Mater. In the prime of his 
superb manhood, in the vigor of his imperial intellect, 
he pleaded for her until spectators, court, and advocate 
were in tears, and the decision then reached made the 
life of this College possible and had more sweeping in- 
fluence upon such institutions and upon the law of 
contracts than any other our court had ever pronounced. 

Dartmouth does well to commemorate in this be- 
coming manner the graduation from her halls one 
hundred years ago of the greatest man of the many 
great men the College and New Hampshire have given 
to the world. Last February we fittingly obser\'ed the 
hundredth anniversary of John jMarshall's advent to 
the bench of our highest court. 

Young men of New Hampshire, look upon the 
lives of these two men and take new hope, new courage, 
new inspiration. 

224 



President Tucker : In the tribute which we pay Chester 
to the memory of Daniel Webster it would be a most Bradley 
ungracious neglect if we should fail to recall the name Jordan 
of E/>ekiel. Daniel and Ezekiel, brothers indeed, of equal 
endowment, sharing the same early fortune, and united 
till death by a love "passing the love of women." I 
take great pleasure in presenting to you, of direct de- 
scent in the collateral branch, Edwin Webster Sanborn 
Esquire, of the class of 1878. 

iSpeecH of Ed'wiii Webster vSan- 
borii, E-squire, *78. 

President Tucker, Ladies and Gentlemen : — 

INCE our people acquired the habit of centen- 
nial celebrations, it has become usual to analyze 
the event undergoing observance, and to test its 



value by the permanent results. The present anniver- 
sary has thus brought out the service of Mr. Webster to 
education, which had been overshadowed by the com- 
mercial importance of the Dartmouth College decision. 
Growing out of his attachment to this College, and his 
faith in the type of culture it represented, it is difficult 
to speak of the results without frequent reference to 
Dartmouth. 

There was a distant relative of Mr. Webster, a 
portly and solemn man, who seized the opportunity, 
whenever visited by his kindred, to furnish, with nnich 
detail, an account of his own personal affairs. This he 
always prefaced with the remark — "I will now do what 
I seldom do, and talk about myself." This formula, 
which is said to have appealed to Mr. Webster's sense of 

225 



Edwin humor, iniwlit be used on behalf of the College, which is 
Webster now receiving its family and friends. Its eminent 
Sanborn guests have recognized by their presence the responsi- 
bility laid upon Dartmouth by its second founder, and 
if the College, through its ofHcers or alumni, persists in 
speaking of itself, — which it does but once in a hundred 
years, — it is hoped that this may be accepted as the due 
accounting of its stewardship. 

So many years having passed without producing 
another Webster, it was doubtless wise to concede that 
his career was not entirely the result of his college life. 
Yet the recent parade has proved, — after the necessar}' 
restorations had been made, — that between the sons of 
Dartmouth, who are the present ornaments of the Bos- 
ton bar, and their illustrious predecessor, the difference, 
after all, is only one of headgear. 

In regard to ]\Ir. Webster himself we have been able 
to show, at least, that Dartmouth was as naturally the 
Webster college as Kearsarge was the Webster moun- 
tain. Kearsarge remains at the old location ; and if the 
alchemy of nature should give us a second Webster, he 
would find at Dartmouth the congenial place to develop 
his genius. 

This grows out of the fact that Dartmouth has 
always been a representative institution of northern New 
England, being shaped by the same persistent forces 
which in the case of Mr. Webster were concentrated upon 
an individual. Of these New England influences the 
first principle is seriousness. The early attempts to 
hammer a livelihood from the soil of the Granite State 
could hardly have been other than a serious employ- 
ment. The young men of those days came to Hanover 

226 



with feeliuf^s of respect for labor and reverence for learn- Edwin 
ing-. Their sentiment was recognized by an early rule AX/cbstcr 
which solved the problem of fitting the punishment to Sanborn 
the crime. "No scholar shall speak diminutively of 
the practice of labor, under penalty of being obliged to 
perform that which he endeavored to discredit." The 
letter of this law died as the College grew in dignity, but 
its spirit has never ceased to haunt us. 

A serious rule of conduct, to give the best results, 
should not be taken too seriously, and it is reassuring 
to note the robust appearance of our alumni, and to re- 
call no serious case of injury from overwork. 

Yet the studious spirit prevails here as far as pos- 
sible with the male, human animal of collegiate age, 
and Dartmouth has always remained identified with 
northern New England. Until recent years, its largest 
class was that of 1842 ; and as nearly as the date can be 
fixed, that was the culminating era of the old Puritan 
New England. After the war, the farmers of this 
region enjoyed a short return of prosperity. In that era 
of high prices, they accumulated a little money which 
they at once began to squander on schools and churches. 
The effect was seen in the seventies, when the college 
classes again increased in numbers. 

In later years as emigration to the West was re- 
newed, the College began to feel the departure of its 
patrons and the need of a new departure for itself. It 
was in those days that a panorama was advertised at 
Norwich of scenes from Pilgrim's Progress. There was 
still a strong feeling at Hanover against the influence 
of the stage ; but this drama was to be presented in a 
church, and its ethical value was so forcibly urged that 

227 



Sanborn 



Edwin a number of people went over, and were much edified. 
Webster 'pQward the close, the slides seemed to move across the 
stage slowly, and with some difficulty. The final scene 
was announced as the Grand Transformation, introduc- 
ing a view of the land of Beulah over the Delectable 
Mountains. To give the effect of sudden transforma- 
tion, this canvas was pushed forward quickly, even be- 
fore the preceding picture — of Giant Despair — had been 
entirely removed. The heavy slide moved a third of 
the way across the stage and came to a stop. There 
were sounds of pushing and lifting, and then a 
pause. In this expectant hush the proprietor w^as heard 
to exclaim, behind the scenes, in husky — but penetra- 
ting — tones, "The derned thing won't go ; it needs 
greasin'." 

The simile is apt if not elegant. In its eventful 
pilgrimage Dartmouth had reached a point where it 
needed the push of an active, constnictive policy, lubri- 
cated by tact and sympathy with affairs. Fortunately 
this need was supplied. We have kept a section of 
Maine and the clientage which comes from the easterly 
watershed of the Green Mountains. IMassachusetts — 
there she stood. We have annexed a large part of her. 
We have reached out to the West for men of the Dart- 
mouth type. The West is geographically our natural 
field. In relation to Hanover almost evervthingf is 
West. As a result, we review the path already trod 
from the serene heights of the Delectable Mountains. 
"The past at least is secure." Looking forward to an- 
other Centennial, there will be no misgivings, if the 
present management consent to remain in charge 
throughout the coming century. 

228 



The most serious criticism of college life is in the Edwin 
charge now current that it breeds extravagance and un- \^cbstcr 
fitness for self-reliant work. It is, perhaps, a vice inher- Sanborn 
ent in all liberal culture that it rather fits a man to 
make the most out of life, than to make the most out 
of his neighbors. But we may say to the anxious par- 
ent — If it be the fate of your son to go through life with 
the burden of a liberal education, here is where it can 
be applied in the most innocuous form. Here is a col- 
lege of which self-reliance is the chief corner-stone ; 
which cultivates not only the humanities, but humanity; 
which aims at developing not only the scholar, but the 
man ; not only at imparting knowledge, but the power 
to work it out for one's self, and apply it to the facts of 
life. 

A young man who can acquire habits of extrava- 
gance at Hanover is possessed of rare creative genius. 
The instinct of wholesome economy is one of the lega- 
cies from our New England ancestry. Yet it was not 
their way to grudge expense for true essentials. Look 
at the list of free public libraries. Of about four hun- 
dred, dependent on taxation, Massachusetts has one 
hundred and seventy-nine ; New Hampshire and Illi- 
nois coming next with thirty-five each. The rest are 
all in New England states or states with strong New 
England influence. New Hampshire is, perhaps, best 
entitled to the motto — Every man his own Carnegie. 
The geographical distribution of libraries confirms the 
suspicion that people send their sons to Dartmouth in 
close proportion to the general diffusion of knowledge. 

For an individual example of the same trait, I 
would cite Elder Shadrack Spafford, of Beaver Meadow, 

229 



Edwin who used to visit Hanover. Elder Spafford had been 
Webster four times married, the amount of household work he 
Sanborn ^as accustomed to exact of his wives not being favor- 
able to conjugal longevity. He happened to be sitting 
in the store when some one read the statement that in 
certain benighted parts of India a wife was often offered 
for sale for a sum equivalent to about fourteen dollars. 
"Wall," was the comment of the Elder, "wall, if she's 
a good un, she's wuth it. She's wuth it." 

Our ancestors wanted the worth of their sacrifice 
for learning, and followed their ideals in education with 
great persistence. The continuity essential to all deep 
and thorough culture is of special value to a college 
based on New England ideas. To the English mind, 
the commendable features of Yankee character are the 
inheritance of pure English blood. Yet the Puritan 
stock at home has achieved nothing noteworth\- and 
distinctive, of recent years, — since the death of Crom- 
well. The Dutch, with more than their usual mental 
agility, after the lapse of two hundred and fifty years, 
are aroused to the discovery that the seeds of New 
England character were attached to the garments of 
the Pilgrims in passing through Holland. But we 
have as yet no far reaching influence, no rich, up- 
lifting literature, no profound philosoph}- in spiritual 
things, — from the Pennsylvania Dutch, or those of 
Sleepy Hollow. 

We have to conclude that the secret was in the 
combination of a serious, energetic people, working out 
the same vital ideas, amid congenial surroundings. If 
so, it is worth while not to lose this combination. The 
fathers wanted to get on in the world : to be something. 

230 



To be something they must know something, and to fit Edwin 
their young men for the highest service of American "^ cbslcr 
citizenship, they invented the American college. Sanborn 

It was the work of Mr. Webster to guard this 
invention from infringement. In framing their in- 
stitutions the early Americans showed a marvellous fore- 
sight into the needs of the people who were to develop 
the country. Daniel Webster was heir to their in- 
tuitions. Those who study the Dartmouth College 
controversy must see that with all its complications, he 
was guided by an instinctive purpose to save what he 
believed to be a sacred inheritance. 

A college of to-day which looked to the eighteenth 
century for its scholarship would also be looking to the 
eighteenth century for its scholars. But it is possible, 
wiiile expanding in size and scope, to keep the practi- 
cal spirit of the early College, with its individuality, 
local sentiment, and characteristic mental discipline. 

The great universities have grown away from the 
college traditions, and seem to be leaving this field to 
the country institutions. They can hardly keep pace 
with the demand for elective, professional, and special- 
ized training. Such demands are best met near the 
rich resources of the cities ; their libraries, art treasures, 
courts, hospitals, asylums and vaudeville entertain- 
ments. But the universities lack the unity of growth 
and unity of structure to maintain the democratic sim- 
plicity of the historic college. 

There is a point beyond which their facilities fail 
to facilitate. The young man, intent upon practical, 
economical training, not as an accomplishment, but 
for the accomplishment of the best work in life, should 

231 



Edwin lift up his eyes unto the hills from whence conieth his 

Webster help. 

Sanborn jj- jg ^ ^j-^^-g saying that our great men came from 

the hill towns. The rule of Uncle Eben Holdeu that 
he "never swore 'less 'twas necessary" applies to the 
almost equally offensive habit of bragging. It should 
only be indulged in when occasion demands it. But an 
anniversary is such an occasion, and candor compels us 
to admit that of our leading statesmen and educators, 
men of influence and character, merchant princes and 
captains of industry, probably ninety per cent come 
directly or indirectly from rural New England. If a 
few of the ninety per cent should be traced to other 
origin, we might use the argument of the Perthshire 
man who claimed that Shakespeare was a Scotchman. 
When asked the reason for his persistence, he said, 
"Wull, men, his abeelity cairtainly warrants the sup- 
poseetion." 

The decay of rural New England threatened the 
supply of this sort of men. But the making of character 
and manhood has finally adapted itself to the new 
order of things. Like other processes, which at first 
were industries of the farm and household, it is now 
chiefly centered in large manufacturing establishments. 
One of these — which we are visiting — is just now con- 
cerned in finding storage room for the increasing raw 
material which comes in the form of freshmen. There 
is also a new sort of appreciative country life growing 
up to sustain the centers of education. 

"Whatever skies above us rise, the hills, the hills are 
home." 



232 



That is what they are for. Old Home Week is growingEdwin 
into an Old Home Year and the Old Home life. Webster 

The hills are also a school. As remarked by aSanborn 
recent writer, the specializing of every kind of work 
has gone so far that the real provincial narrowness is 
found in the cities. Before one enters the narrow, 
confined avenue of his life work in Boston or in New 
York, he should lay the foundation of broad, cos- 
mopolitan culture at Hanover, Amherst or Williams- 
town. The degree of Master of Arts seems to lack its 
full meaning in the hands of one who has studied the 
arts of man, but has learned nothing from nature, 
which is the art of God. 

New England forces lose vitality without some 
reminder of New England hills. The Yankee flourishes 
only, as expressed by a fervid orator, where he is "sur- 
rounded on all sides by the nature of the country." In 
the rolling, diversified country of the Middle West, the 
Yankee stock maintains a noble civilization, but farther 
away, on treeless, sunbaked plains, it loses its social 
and economic bearings and follows the strangest of 
strange gods, with a devotion which varies with annual 
rainfall and prevalence of locusts. The place to revive 
the spirit of the fathers is where it reached its greatest 
intensity in the rugged scenes and tonic air of northern 
New England. Not that a college to attain the high- 
est culture must perch on the summit of Mount Washing- 
ton. The ideal location is among hills of about the 
size and contour of Balch's Hill, with mountains at the 
correct psychological distance, like Ascutney and Moosi- 
lauke. 



233 



Edwin In the neighboring cemetery is a stone com- 

Webster memorating one of the many interesting characters who 
Sanborn jjave lived at Hanover, named Sally Duget. This 
woman succnmbed more abrnptly than most of us to the 
Hanover climate, and perished in a snow storm. Han- 
over children were encouraged to wander in the ceme- 
tery, in gloomy weather, for the improving associations, 
and committed to memory many of these inscriptions. 
In the Duget epitaph is one phrase which I have con- 
verted to my own use — "Under the guise of cheerful- 
ness she hid deep woes." 

Under the guise of assumed cheerfulness, I have 
been endeavoring to hide, probably with entire success, 
a serious proposition : that the twentieth century opens 
in striking similarity with the nineteenth in the 
need for educated and educating public spirit. The 
eighteenth century had been fertile in liberal ideas. 
The period a hundred years ago was filled with re- 
joicings over the newly-found rights of man. The 
nineteenth century has brought an equally wonderful 
progress in material expansion. We are now rejoicing 
in great commercial prosperity. But the old New 
England trait of prudence is not to be neglected. 

For nice discrimination in the use of caution, no 
one could surpass the late Horace Frary. INIany of you 
recall the Dartmouth Hotel — the unconventional attire 
of its proprietor ; the grace in dispensing hospitality; 
the expressive soprano voice ; the vest, rich with the 
spoils of time. In case of slight illness Mr. Frary made 
no objection to a physician. There came a time when 
he was attacked with a sudden and serious malady. Mrs. 
Frary saw Dr. Crosby coming down the street, and 

234 



started to call him in. Mr. Frary raised himself in bed Edwin 
and cried ont in terrified appeal, "Do n't let him in. Webster 
Do n't let the critter get in. This ain't no time to be Sanborn 
foolin' with doctors; I tell ye, I'm sick." 

This seems to betray a lack of confidence in one of 
the learned professions ; but in its esoteric meaning it 
breathes the profoundest political philosophy. The 
time for a nation to take counsel of its physicians is 
when it is well. The old-time patriot was always ready 
to prescribe. The Commencement oratory of 1801 was 
full of heroic sentiment respecting the preservation of 
our liberties. As read to-day, the language of those 
young men, without money or influence, on the north- 
ern frontier of the new nation — their talk of saving the 
Union — seems like a huge joke. The point of the joke 
is that one of them did save the Union, as far as could 
be done in his day by one human being. 

The passion for equal rights has now been suc- 
ceeded by the passion for more equal wealth. Our an- 
cestors were absorbed with questions of right, appealing 
to the heart and conscience. The present problems 
reach more deeply into the ultimate springs of human 
conduct. They touch the pocket. 

They call not only for broad-minded, humane 
.statesmanship, but for practical, educated common 
sense. Poisons brewed in the seething cities of Europe, 
must be counteracted by old-fashioned, country-bred 
patriotism made in America. It is not likely that su- 
preme public service will again be rendered by a single 
massive and commanding intellect, but men of Dart- 
mouth can be relied upon to keep the faith of the fathers, 
and, trained in sympathy with the people, to voice the 

235 



bdwin sobej- thouo:ht of the nation and hold up the hieh stand- 
Webster f & 

Sanborn 



ard of American citizenship. 



President Tucker : Among the men whom we 
inevitably recall as we think of ]\Ir. Webster in his 
relation to the Dartmouth College Case, there is no 
stronger nor more prophetic figure than that of the then 
youthful president of the College, Francis Brown. We 
know what he wrought in his time, we know what he 
left as a heritage, not only in his work but in the stock 
which he planted here. I have the pleasure of present- 
ing to the audience, Francis Brown of the third genera- 
tion. 



SpeecK of Professor Francis 
Brown, U.l}., LL. D., '70. 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — 

SOUR days ago I had no hope of being here this 
evening. A ship struggling with heavy weather 
in mid-ocean held out no promise. I had gone so 



far as to frame the telegram which I should have the 
pain of sending from New York this afternoon explaining 
my absence. And even now that fortune has been kinder 
to me than I had a right to expect, there are two seri- 
ous drawbacks to the full satisfaction of the evening for 
me. One is the deep regret at not having enjoyed with 
you the feast of good things that has preceded this ban- 
quet for the last two days. The orations and the 
choruses and the illuminations have not been for me. I 
have not even had the opportunity of attiring myself in 
the festal garments in which so many of my brother 

236 



alumni have been bravely disporting themselves. ButFf^ncis 
the more serious drawback lies in the difficulty of the^^'own 
subject which has been presented to me. Since the 
career of Daniel Webster is not complete without the 
history of the Dartmouth College Case, and since in 
the Dartmouth College Case the active head of the Col- 
lege was closely concerned, it has seemed fitting to you, 
sir, that some reference should be made here to the con- 
nection of President Brown with that Case. And my 
problem is, within brief limits of time, and without do- 
ing substantial injustice to the theme, to discuss it in 
terms befitting the modesty of the man himself, and not 
unbecoming in one who bears his name. In this diffi- 
cult situation it has seemed to me that the path of safety 
was the path of simplicity. Therefore, without attempt- 
ing to analyze or weigh the precise serv^ice of President 
Brown, I shall try merely to indicate a few aspects of 
the Dartmouth College Case as they presented them- 
selves to him. 

In the first place, then, the struggle into which he 
entered was for him a moral issue. It was a moral issue 
in the sense of not being a mere legal battle, and in the 
sense also of not being a mere personal concern. In a 
legal battle, as such, he would have had deep and intel- 
ligent interest. In personal affairs as such he would 
have had that concern which becomes every man. But 
the Case of the College presented itself to him primarily 
under its moral aspect, as involving great and enduring 
principles^of human life and action. His relation to it 
cannot be appreciated without remembering that the 
difficulty did not originate under his administration. 
He found it when he came upon the stage. It was not 

237 



Francis of his choice, that, in one aspect of this difRculty, it 
Brown seemed to bring him into conflict with the authorities 
of the Commonwealth. He was a native of this state 
and loved and honored it. He was born, as Webster 
himself was born, before the Constitution of the United 
States was adopted. He had that reverence for State- 
hood which belonged to the time of those beginnings, 
and which had not begun to be overshadowed as it has 
been for some minds in recent years, — not wholly to 
our good, — by the sole conception of the national life. 
He had no zeal, therefore, in any contest which opposed 
him to the authorities of the Commonwealth. But the 
College Case embodied for him that which he revered 
with the profoundest forces of his mind and heart. It 
meant for him the confidence of donors, it meant for 
him the solemnity of prayers, it meant the consecration 
of lives, it meant a history already worth connnemorat- 
ing and preserving as men had been trained and fitted 
for the work of life ; the whole embodiment of the Col- 
lege in its sacredness and power entered into his con- 
ception of the Case, and it seemed to him that, standing 
as he did and representing what he did, a moral impera- 
tive was upon him which he dared not refuse to follow, 
and that in fighting for the College he was obeving 
God. 

In the next place the struggle appealed to him as 
a demand upon intellect. He felt that the utmost pow- 
ers of his mind were claimed bv the Colleg^einthat criti- 
cal time, in reference to the question of its right to be. 
The head of a college, placed as Dartmouth College was 
in those years, he felt nnist know his ground, must 
command the situation. Whether or not he appeared be- 

238 



fore the public eye as a leader in the work, he must Francis 
be within himself conscious in some degree of the Brown 
mastery of leadership. The situation, in its many phases, 
was, of course, discussed privately, a hundred times over, 
in advance of its public argument before the courts, and 
I understand that he was not without gifts enabling 
him to enter into the details of the Case, master them in 
their somewhat complicated history and relations, and 
hold them firmly and steadily, keeping their balance 
and their proportion, and so, from time to time, from 
month to month, from year to weary year, rendering 
real service to those who were called to plead, in all the 
various steps and stages through which the struggle 
passed till its final and crowning triumph. 

In the third place, the struggle presented itself to 
his mind as hopeful because of its great alliances. These 
alliances involved mutual trust, a common responsibili- 
ty, the sharing in one great work. The abundance of 
the allies he found, the trustworthiness and comfort of 
them, he appreciated and never belittled. The alliance 
of the students of his time was something which he 
prized beyond words. I believe that he had personal 
attractiveness and winning power, and that students 
were drawn towards him ; that seeing in him, in some 
sense, an embodiment of the institution, under whose 
care they were studying and which they were learning 
to love, they loved it in him. The names of some of 
those who were undergraduates in his time will susfgest 
the larger company of men, who, as students, held loy- 
ally to the work of the College through all that trying 
time. Such names as those of George P. Marsh, Judge 
Nathan Crosby, Judge Nesmith, Rufus Choate, all 

239 



Francis graduated during his brief term of service as president, 
Brown remind us of the choice spirits among the undergraduates 
of those years, and of the worthy alliance on which he 
depended when he trusted them. Then there was the 
faculty, working under difficulties that we can hardly 
appreciate, and doing faithfully the work that was set 
them to do. There were the trustees, holding steadfastly 
on their way, hoping for the light that was to come. 
There were of course, also, those figures that comeback 
most familiarly to us all as we review the Case, those 
lawyers of New Hampshire who stood for the College 
here, those who represented it before the Supreme Court 
of the nation, and, chief of all, the great advocate to 
whom the success of the College, by common agreement, 
was most largely due. It was in alliance with these men 
and by such alliance alone that he felt success for the 
right could be gained. 

Just one aspect more I shall venture to mention. 
He regarded his concern in the struggle of the College 
as an addition to the common daily work of the presi- 
dency, and not as a substitute for it. It seems to me 
that the ethical power involved in a statement of that 
kind is no unworthy matter for us to think of to-night. 
It was not his to devote himself exclusively to repre- 
senting the College before the legal tribunals of the state 
and nation, or even before that wider tribunal in which 
verdicts are given by the agreement of right-minded 
men. He felt much of the burden of a champion, but 
this obligation was in a certain sense a mere adjunct to 
his chief activity. The college life had to go on, the 
young men who were here had to be taught, all the de- 
tails of college work had to be managed, and the double 

240 



strain, it is easy to believe, was that which brought his Francis 
life to so early an end. And he himself did not grudge Brown 
it. He gave all he had. He gave himself a])Solutely. 
He spent his powers without reserve. The vital force 
was exhausted at the end of the struggle and he died 
the year after the decision was given. He had not 
been called to lead the forces on the battle-field. He was 
the commander of the garrison, holding on, while the 
brilliant tactician and general was waging the fight out 
in the open. The captain of the garrison, whose first 
duty is within the walls, but whose heart and brain are 
in the hot battle outside, may have an ethical force in 
him quite equal to that of the active leader who wins 
the battle. He may not claim the credit of the victory, 
but he may have greatly helped to make the victory 
worth the while. 

For such reasons as these, it is, perhaps, appropriate 
that President Brown should be remembered in the 
Webster Celebration. I have in my possession the 
autograph letter which ^Mr. Webster wrote to him just 
after the decision was rendered in Washington. If it 
had been accessible to me this morning I should have 
brought it with me. Not that it is unknown ; it has 
been published. But there is some interest in the 
paper itself with Mr. Webster's handwriting and 
signature upon it. It bears perpetual witness to the 
close relation between Daniel Webster, the great 
jurist, and the president of the College, doing his quiet 
work here, and standing bravely for what he believed 
the right. 

I must not say more of him now. He sleeps not 
far from this spot. His son has been laid to rest beside 

241 



Francis him. And there some day his son's son hopes also 
Brown to lie. I have no quarrel with those who in thinking 
of the rewards of the future dwell upon crowns and 
golden harps, — having some understanding of what 
these things symbolize, — but I should be sorry for the 
man who was looking forward to the crown without 
service rendered, or to whom the opportunity for 
larger service w^as not the brightest diadem. For noble 
minds, the greatest reward must lie in the service, and 
not in the wages of service; work done of which the 
result lives on after the workman has stopped working, 
is itself the truest reward. And, in that sense again, it 
seems not unfitting to join in this place the names of 
Daniel Webster and President Brown. By faithful 
service men live and by the fruits of it institutions grow 
great and endure. If Dartmouth is growing great and 
shall endure, the ground of it must be sought in the 
service, great or small, of many faithful ones working to- 
gether with consecrated purpose, who find a stimulus in 
the undying hope of making their lives worth while for 
their College, and for their country, and for the world. 



President Tucker: When we wish to bring the past 
and the present of the College together, there is one 
man amongst us in whom they meet on equal terms, 
Judge Cross, of the class of 1841. 



242 



Cross 



SpeecK of tKe Honorable David David 
Cross, L/Iv. D., *41» 

Mr. President and Brothers — and you, so near and yet so 
far [apostrophizing the ladies in the distant gal- 
lery]:— 

feel oppressed, Mr. President, as I rise to speak 
on this occasion, as never before. Voices speak 
to me that do not to any of you. Sixty-four 



I 



years ago I came to Hanover a student. The boys that 
were with me then, where are they? Echo answers, 
"Where?" A few survive. Most are gone. Voices 
speak to me in happy memory. Voices speak to me in 
solemn, sad recollection, and it seems as if I must pour 
out my soul here to-night and talk of things that I 
have felt and have seen and have known, connected 
with dear old Dartmouth College. But, brethren, last 
week I received a summons from our President, whom 
we all delight to honor and obey, saying, "Come to the 
Webster Banquet and talk six or eight minutes on Dan- 
iel Webster's training at the New Hampshire bar." I 
yield lo the proprieties of the occasion, I subdue the 
joyous thoughts of college life and present simply a 
lawyer's brief. 

In 1818, at thirty-six years of age, Mr. Webster 
made his argument in the Dartmouth College Case 
before the Supreme Court of the United States. It was 
addressed, as Rufus Choate has said, "To a tribunal 
presided over by Marshall, assisted by Washington, 
Livingston, Johnson, Story, Todd, and Duvall — a 
tribunal unsurpassed on earth of all that gives il- 
lustration to a bench of law and sustained and venerated 

243 



David bv a noble bar." His opponents were William Wirt, 
Cross Holmes, and other most illustrious lawyers of the time. 
The legal aro-ument occupied five hours and the per- 
oration, as described by Professor Goodrich, was the most 
brilliant ever heard in that court. The judges and the 
listeners were moved to tears as Mr. W^ebster appealed, 
with eloquent words and trembling lips, for the life of 
the College. His argument prevailed and a construction 
of the Constitution of the United States was then given 
of far-reaching importance, not only for this College, 
but for everv eleemosvnarv institution in the United 
States. The reputation of Mr. Webster before, as a 
lawyer, was local, but it immediately became national, 
and from that time he was the acknowledged great 
lawyer. 

On this one hundredth anniversary of his gradu- 
ation, his characteristics as student, scholar, lawyer, 
diplomat and statesman have been presented in fitting 
eloquent tribute, but the one distinguishing act of his 
life, the one which comes nearest to our hearts, the one 
which links his name indissolubly with us and our 
College is that argument in 1818 which won for him 
the title of "Refounder of Dartmouth College." 

Up to the time of this argument nearly all his 
education and training had been in New Hampshire. 
Before reviewing his training at the New Hampshire 
bar I think it desirable to speak briefly of him as a col- 
lege boy and law student. His college education and 
preparation for the law was not the result of any 
special planning by himself or his parents. He went 
to college because his father, like other New England 
fathers, wished to give his children the benefit of an 

244 



education which he had no opportunity of acquiring for David 
himself, and because his son exhibited a passion for Cross 
reading and study. He read every book within his 
reach and committed to memory almost everything he 
read so that there was no period in his after life when 
he was not able to repeat verbatim what he had learned 
in his boyhood. He read Don Quixote at one sitting, 
or during one night ; he committed to memory mucli 
of the Bible, Watts' Hymns, whole books of poetry and 
many of the great speeches of distinguished men. 

The story as given in Mr. Webster's autobiography 
of that ride from his home to the Rev. Mr. Woods' school, 
when his father first spoke of his intention to give him 
a college education, is a pathetic revelation of a son's 
tender reverence and appreciation of a father's self- 
sacrificinof love. It reveals also the desire and ambition 
of the son for an education. 

From all that I can learn from his autobiography, 
his letters published by bis son Fletcher, from tradition 
and biography, I do not believe that INIr. Webster, before 
he commenced the practice of law, had any idea of his 
superior ability or the high position he would attain. 
He was induced to study law by his father's wish, 
rather than from any well considered thought or plan 
of his own. 

There has been a sort of tradition that at one time 
be contemplated studying for the ministry, but I cannot 
find any facts to confirm such report. It does seem to 
me, however, that if he had been urged to the study of 
theology by his father, as he was urged to the study of 
law, he would have become a great theologian instead 
of a great lawyer. 

245 



David His letters to his brother Ezekiel, his classmates, 

Qoss Bingham, ^Merrill and others, written while in college 
and later, are delightfnl reading and give us a view of 
Webster such as no one can know who has looked upon 
him only as the great expounder of the Constitution of 
the United States. 

I am tempted to quote extensively from his cor- 
respondence because these letters bring him before us 
as a student, as a friend and brother; intensely human, 
full of joy, poetry, and the humor of life, with a mind of 
sincere honesty of purpose and devotion to truth, duty, 
and religion, and a heart of boundless wealth of af- 
fection for family and friends. 

Thirty young men graduated in the class of iSoi, 
eleven became lawyers, of whom not one attained dis- 
tinction in his profession except Webster. 

He was in ISIr. Thompson's office nearly three years 
and in Christopher Gore's office in Boston a few months ; 
was admitted to the bar in Suffolk County, Massachu- 
setts, in June, 1805; returned to Boscawen and remained 
about two years, and removed to Portsmouth, in 1807. 
In a letter to his classmate Bingham, dated at Fryeburg, 
May, 1802, he wrote, "Now, I will enumerate the in- 
ducements that draw me towards law. First, and 
principally, it is my father's wish. He does not dictate, 
it is true, but how much short of dictation is the mere 
wish of a parent, whose labors of life are wasted on 
favors to his children. Even the delicacy with which 
this wish is expressed, gives it more effect than it 
would have in the form of a command. Secondly, my 
friends generally wish it. They are urgent and press- 
ing. My father even ofiers me — T will sometime tell 

246 



you what — and ^Ir. Thompson offers my tuition gratis, David 
and to relinquish his stand to me." Gross 

May 3, 1802, in a letter to Fuller he says, "The law 
is certainly, as it seems to me, rather hard study and to 
mollify it with some literary amusements I should think 
profitable." 

In a letter to his classmate, Merrill, January', 1803, 
he wrote, "This law reading, Thomas, has no tendency 
to add the embellishments of literature to a student's 
acquisitions. Our books are written in a hard, didactic 
style, interspersed on every page with the mangled 
pieces of murdered Latin." 

In a letter to Mr. Cook, June, 1803, he wrote, "I am 
not informed what profession you are determined to 
study, but if it be law, permit me to tell you a little 
what you must expect. Lly experience in the study is 
indeed short, but I have learnt a little about it. First 
then, you must bid adieu to all hopes of meeting with, 
a single author who pretends to elegance of style or 
sweetness of obser^- ation . " 

In November, 1803, he wrote to Merrill, "Accuracy 
and diligence are much more necessary to a lawyer, 
than great comprehension of mind, or brilliancy of tal- 
ent. His business is to refine, define, and split hairs, 
to look into authorities, and compare cases. A man 
can never gallop over the fields of law on Pegasus, nor 
fly across them on the wing of oratory. If he would 
stand on terra Grma he must descend ; if he would be a 
great lawyer, he must first consent to be only a great 
drudge." 

In his Autobiography ]\Ir. Webster said, "I read 
Coke on Littleton through without understanding a 

247 



David quarter part of it. Why disgust and discourage a boy 
Cross by telling liim that he must break into his profession 
through such a wall as reading Coke? I really often 
despaired. I thought T never could make myself a 
lawyer and was almost going back to the business of 
school teaching." 

In 1805 in a letter to IMerrill, from Boston, he 
wrote, "Gifford's Life and Posthumous Works, ]\Ioore's 
Travels in France and Italy, et pauca alia similia, have 
rescued me from the condemnation of doing nothing. 
At present, I am in earnest in the study of the French 
language, and can now translate about as much, for a 
task, as we could of Tully in our Freshman year." 

In May, 1805, in a letter to Bingham, written at 
Boscawen: "You must know that I have opened a shop 
in this village for the manufacture of justice writs. 
Other mechanics do pretty well here, and I am deter- 
mined to try my luck among others." And in one 
dated January, 1806, "T^Iy business has been just about 
so, so ; its quantity less objectionable than its quality." 

At the September term, 1805, he entered in the 
Superior Court of Hillsborough county, at Hopkinton, 
twenty-two writs and argued two causes before the jury 
in the presence of his father, one of the judges upon the 
bench. These causes were Haddock v. W^oodward and 
Corson v. Corson, both of small importance. He won 
the former and lost the latter. Parker Noyes, one of 
the most skilful practitioners in the state was his oppos- 
ino- counsel. The original writs are on file in the office 
of the Superior Court at Nashua. 

The next spring he was assigned by the court to 
defend a criminal for murder in the Grafton County 

248 



Court. The murder was of such an atrocious nature David 
and so unprovoked that Webster could find only one Cross 
ground for defence — that of insanity. The argument 
of Webster for the defence attracted wide attention at 
the time and gained him a reputation in all that region 
of New Hampshire as the most adroit and skilful law- 
yer of the state. 

Mr, Webster's real life as a lawyer commenced in 
1807 in Portsmouth. The men practising in Rocking- 
ham County during the nine years he lived and practised 
there constituted a body of lawyers hardly equalled by 
the same number at any time in this country. To give 
their names is sufficient for any lawyer to recall some- 
thinof of the wonderful abilitv and achievements of these 
men at the bar in New Hampshire, in Massachusetts, 
and in Washington. Among them were Joseph Story, 
Samuel Dexter, Theophilus Parsons, of Massachusetts, 
Jeremiah Smith, William Plummer, George Sullivan, 
Ichabod Bartlett and Jeremiah Mason of New Hamp- 
shire. George Sullivan had then been eleven years at 
the bar, WilliamPlummer thirteen, and Jeremiah Smith 
twenty-three years, while Ichabod Bartlett was four 
years later. 

The biographer of William Plummer, in speaking 
of the Rockingham Bar at this time, says, "The bar was 
well denominated at this period of its greatest strength 
'the arena of giants.' It indeed witnessed the strife 
of Titans. Weak men did not mingle in it ; strong 
men felt their need of strength." Judge Story charac- 
terized it as one of "vast law learning and prodigious 
intellectual power." 



249 



David Jeremiah Smith was profoundly learned in the 

Cross common law and a most accomplished scholar, superior 
in exact scholarship to either ]\Iason or Webster. 

Mason and Smith had remarkable, and, perhaps, 
equal industry in the preparation of causes; Smith 
fortifying his position with accurate authority while 
ISIason trusted more to his native strength and force of 
reason. 

The biographer of Theophilus Parsons says that 
"The reform which Judge Smith began was effectually 
carried out and the pleading in New Hampshire w^as 
probably as accurate and skilful as in any state of the 
Union." Joel Parker said of Smith that "under him the 
practice of law was reduced to practical science." 

George Sullivan and Ichabod Bartlett were both 
eminent in their profession and would rank at any time 
among the best lawyers in the state. They, however, 
were inferior in many points to Alason, and Smith and 
Webster. 

Jeremiah Smith by his learning, his industry and 
great ability, helped Webster. He was aided undoubt- 
edly by the other eminent men named, but he was 
trained more by Jeremiah Llason than by all others. I 
believe that his association with Jeremiah Mason dur- 
ing his nine years of law practice in New Hampshire, 
helped train Webster's mind not alone for law and for 
the exhibition of profound learning as a lawyer, but 
as well for statesmanship and for conciseness and clear- 
ness, such as he afterwards exhibited in his Bunker 
Hill speeches, theGirard Will Case, the reply to Hayne 
of South Carolina, in the trial of Knapp at Salem, the 
Dartmouth College and other celebrated cases. 

250 



Mr. Webster once said, "When I went to Ports- David 
moutli I was a young man of twenty-four and Mr. Cross 
Mason forty. He was then at the head of the bar, and 
was employed in nearly all the great cases. He was a 
terror to young lawyers, but we traveled together and 
roomed together and he was one of my earliest, truest, 
and best friends." 

Mr. Choate once asked Webster's opinion of IMason, 
and among other things he said, "I regard Jeremiah 
Mason as eminently superior to any other lawyer whom 
I have ever met. I would rather, with my own ex- 
perience (and I have had some pretty tough experiences 
with him) , meet them all combined in a case than to 
meet him alone and single handed. He was the 
keenest lawyer I have ever met or read about. If a 
man had Jeremiah Mason and he did not get his case, 
no human ingenuity or learning could get it." 

Mr. Webster, late in life said, "If you were to ask 
me who was the greatest lawyer in the country I should 
answer, John Marshall, but if you took me by the 
throat and pinned me to the wall and demanded my 
real opinion I should be compelled to say it was Jeremiah 
Mason. ' ' At another time he said, "Mason's method of 
argument led me to study my own style and set about 
reforming it." 

In November, 1849, ]\Ir. Webster introduced reso- 
lutions before the United States Court in honor of 
Jeremiah IMason, then lately deceased, and a part of one 
of these resolutions was in these words, "In the fact 
that the state of New Hampshire now possesses such 
a system of law whose gladsome light has shone in 
other states, are seen both the product and the nionu- 

25J 



David ment of liis labors, less conspicuous, if not less real 
Cross than as if embodied in codes and institutions bearing 
liis name." 

In his remarks upon that occasion, he said, "I am 
bound to say that of my own professional discipline and 
attainments, whatever they may be, I owe much to 
that close attention to the discharge of my duties which 
I was compelled to pay for nine succesive years, from 
day to day by ]\Ir. Mason's efforts and arguments at the 
bar. ^Fas est ab hoste doceri;^ and I must have 
been unintelligent, indeed, not to have learned some- 
thing from the constant display of that power which 
I had so much occasion to see and feel." 

It is well authenticated by biographers of Mr. 
Webster that his style before he had known ]\Iason had 
been somewhat florid ; afterwards it was terse, simple 
and graphic. 

Mr. Lodge says, "Fortune showered many favors 
upon ]\Ir. Webster, but none more valuable than that of 
having Jeremiah ]\Iason as his chief opponent at the 
New Hampshire bar. He gave i\Ir. Webster his friend- 
ship, staunch and unfailing, until his death. He gave 
freely also of his wisdom and experience in advice and 
counsel. The strong qualities of Mr. Webster's mind 
fully developed by constant practice and under such 
influences. In a word, the unequalled power of stating 
facts or principles which was a predominant quality of 
Mr. Webster's genius grew steadily with a vigorous 
vitality, while his eloquence developed in a similar 
striking fashion. But the best lesson Mr. Webster 
learned from his wary, yet daring antagonist, was in 
regard to style." 

252 



In 1806 Mr. Webster was a country lawyer, twenty- David 
four years of age, bringing- suits for the collection of Cross 
small debts and other trifling causes of action, trying 
them before uneducated justices of the peace who, 
according to custom, decided for the lawyer employing 
them, and occasionally also contending in the higher 
courts with sharp practitioners, like Parker Noyes. 
His annual income at this time did not exceed six hun- 
dred dollars. To remain there would tend to make him 
like his contestants, or more likely, drive him from 
the p rfession. 

More than most men Mr. Webster needed the spur 
and excitement of a great cause and a strong opponent 
to bring out his best mental resources. At Portsmouth, 
in 1807, he immediately felt the necessity for his 
utmost effort. Then he began to see the "gladsome 
light of jurisprudence" and to understand the funda- 
mental principles of common law and equity. 

Then he first really discovered himself ; then he put 
on the giant armor of his knighthood and with exulting 
heart met men of his own mental strength and of his 
own high ideals and aspirations. 

It was his seven years at Portsmouth that developed 
and trained him to become the "first of American 
lawyers and the first of American statesmen." 

From all that I can learn of Mr. Webster and his 
contemporaries ; from history and biography and his 
own writings, I arrive at the conclusion that it was 
during his nine years' practice of law in New Hamp- 
shire that he was trained and trained himself in his 
knowledge of the common law, in the preparation of 
causes for the jury and the court ; in the cross-exami- 

253 



David nation of witnesses ; in liis method and manner of 
Cross argument ; in simplicity, directness and strength of 
written and oral speech. 

President Tucker : There are few occasions of this 
nature, or of any public intent or concern, complete 
without the word of Dr. William Everett. But our 
special claim upon him lies in the fact of his knowledge 
of Mr. Webster as Secretary of State through his father, 
the successor of Mr. Webster in the State Department. 



iSpeecH of tl\e Honorable William 
Everett, PK. D., LL. D. 

Mr. President : — 

feel that I might almost sav I began life under 
the aeo-is of ?^Ir. Webster as Secretary of State. 



I 



-fc>' 



I had tlie misfortune, sir, to be born under Van 
Buren. I admit it. But before I acquired conscious- 
ness, VanBuren was out of power, and the ver\' first 
glimmering of consciousness, so far back that when I 
say I recollect certain things, old friends tell me I do not 
recollect them, but that they were told me, was under his 
successor. Mr. Edward Webster was a member of our 
household, then domiciled in Florence, and I was held 
in his arms. I had his name breathed in my ears as 
early as that of any of my family. It was his father's 
commission that brought us from Florence to London, 
and my first undoubted, continuous recollections begin 
in London, when his name was spoken exactly as often 
in our household as any of our own kindred. I feel, 
sir, that I have a right to speak of the services of that 

254 



man whom, indeed, I never heard in public, but whom I William 

knew in a better way than in public. Everett 

" Seen him I have, but in his happier hour 
Of social pleasure, ill exchanged for power." 

I saw him in our house. There was no stateliness 
there, there was no pompousness, there was no draw- 
ing back, as if he was too great for common persons 
to look up to, which is the way you would think he 
was by some of the portraits and descriptions. No, 
when he came into our house, and my mother, who was 
afraid of nothing under heaven, held out her hands to 
him, she took him right off his high horse, and he was 
the easiest and most affectionate and gentlest of mortals. 
There is, sir, a touching story in the Arabian legends 
of how, long after the great reformer had disappeared, 
the son of his follower was murdered by a tyrant, and 
as the head of Hassan was brought to him, he struck 
his staff on the lip, and an old man said, "I have seen 
those lips pressed to the lips of the prophet of God." 
No tyrant will ever think it worth while to strike at my 
head, — but these lips have been pressed to the lips of 
him who was, indeed, to Americans a prophet of God. 

In the few minutes which it is proper for me to 
take, sir, I am glad of the opportunity to say a few 
words of Webster's services as Secretary of State. The 
country may, perhaps, think of him chiefly in connection 
with the work of the Senate House, but the permanent 
work he wrought for our relations with foreign nations 
is a thing which Americans ought not to forget. i\Ir. 
Webster took a stand in the State department which is 
the one which every American should take, that of 
perfect dignity, of perfect calmness, of reasoning out 

255 



"William tlie quarrels of America in such a way that foreign 
Everett powers shall be forced to recognize the truth of 
our position and there will never be any danger of 
war or even of quarrelling, for such arguments as his 
will always silence, as his silenced any opposing word 
among the other nations, if there were any. You 
know, for instance, that there had been a constant quar- 
rel between England and America on the subject of the 
right of search, which had led to a war, and when peace 
was made at the end of the war which was made for 
the right of search, nothing was ever said about the right 
of search in the treaty, and the quarrel remained in spite 
of the war, Mr. Webster as Secretary of State addressed 
a letter to Lord Aberdeen on the right of search, and 
that letter never was answered by the English Govern- 
ment, but the right of search was never talked about 
again from the time that letter was written. 

Webster also as Secretary of State negotiated the 
first Extradition Treaty — the first treaty which en- 
abled us to feel that those criminals who escaped to 
foreign nations were still as much in our power as if 
they had remained within our borders and that other 
nations might feel the same of us. Just consider, 
brethren, — Dartmouth men are l:)rethren of Harvard 
men, ain't they? — just consider, brethren ; suppose in 
this last terrible assassination which has stricken the 
heart of the country to its depths, perpetrated on the 
very borders of Canada, the criminal had managed to 
escape to Canada across the Niagara River, should we 
have been troubled ? No, because he would have been 
surrendered by the Government of Canada as completely 
as if he had escaped to Philadelphia or Detroit. But 

256 



before Ur. Webster's time he would not have been sur- William 
rendered. Now, escape would have been as useless to Everett 
him across the border as it would have been to the edge 
of the country, and that great blessing we owe to his 
negotiations as Secretary of State. 

But he did something greater and better for us. 
When Mr. Webster came in as General Harrison's Sec- 
retary, England and America were on the verge of war. 
There was a quarrel about the northeastern boundar>' 
and about the northwestern boundar>^ There was a 
quarrel on the border of Niagara about the sympathizers 
and the arrest of McLeod. The English Foreign office 
had been in the hands of Lord Palmerston. That man 
was determined to pick a quarrel with every land which 
did not submit to his dictation. Happily that govern- 
ment had gone out of power about the time Gen. Har- 
rison's government came into power in this country, 
and ]\Ir. Webster was determined that the causes of 
quarrels which had existed off and on for half a century 
should be put an end to. A special envoy was sent 
from England, and ]\Ir. Webster met Lord Ashburton 
with open hands, and not with clenched fists. The 
northeastern boundary apparently could not be settled; 
it seemed as if there nmst be a war if each nation held 
what each considered its rights. Such a war would 
have been popular in the United States. There was 
dissatisfaction with Great Britain. Two wars had not 
let out enough bad blood and there must be a third. 
Supposing Mr. Webster had said to Lord Ashburton, 
' 'We will maintain our rights ; we will maintain that the 
Hio-hlands, which divide the rivers flowing into the St. 

try ' , 

Lawrence from the rivers flowing into the Atlantic, are 

257 



'William where we say and not where you say." If he had also 
Everett said, "We will claim Oregon to 54°4o', and if you do 
not like it we will fight for it," how popular that would 
have been! How all the yeomanry in the North and all 
the chivalry of the South would have rushed across the 
St. Lawrence and the St. Croix and the Columbia! 
Think of the Princeton, which was receiving her arms 
that proved fatal to ]\Ir. Webster's successor, how she 
would have been sent out to prey upon the English 
commerce. Think how he might have floated into the 
presidency as the great war secretary at the end of 
Tyler's term. Think how popular he would have be- 
come with the Whig party that had almost renounced 
him for staying in the cabinet. He knew better. He 
was willing to give up what the state of jMaine thought 
were her rights, he was willing to give up everything 
that might have given him a crown of glory equal to 
any great war statesman, for the more enduring, the 
more perfect crown, "Blessed are the peacemakers for 
they shall be called the children of God." He knew 
that any war, all wars, are sins and crimes and blunders, 
but he knew that the war between England and the 
United States for a few square miles near the St. Johns 
River was a crime, a sin, a blunder beyond comparison, 
and he was w'illing to sacrifice what a meaner, a less far- 
sighted, a more passionate statesman would have held 
as his glory, in order to make and keep the peace be- 
tween those who never should be at war. 

He settled the boundary, and England became friends 
with us. They said in England that her rights were given 
up ; we said in America that our rights were given up. 
What right is more precious than that of living in peace 

258 



with those with whom war is a sin ? In conseqnence of William 
that action of his, settling the northeastern boundary, Everett 
there followed in the next administration the settlement 
of the northwestern boundary. That was not entrusted to 
him, but although it was done by the next administra- 
tion it was just as much his work as the northeastern 
boundary, because if he had not settled tlie northeast- 
ern boundary as he did the next administration would 
never have gone on and perfected his work. 

Upon what he did in his second administration as 
Secretary of State I will not dwell here. All I can say 
here is that those who declare that after his Seventh of 
March Speech he lost all credit with the nation, entirely 
forget that second administration; they forget that mag- 
nificent state paper, the Hiilsemann Letter. If any- 
one fancies that Americans had given up their states- 
man of 1S50, he may see what Mr. Webster did in 1851 
and 1852, holding the pen in his hand and signing the 
papers that were to state the opinion of America in dig- 
nified terms down to the very moment of his death. When 
he was lying in that darkened chamber at Marshfield he 
was thinking of the public business and arranging for its 
proper transaction to the very last. And while Secre- 
tary of State the second time he combined the orator 
with the statesman. Although he was not in a position 
where oratory is generally looked for, he made his mag- 
nificent Fourth of July Speech at the laying of the 
corner-stone of the capitol in 1851, when he uttered one 
of the most remarkable prophecies ever recorded in po- 
litical history and raised himself entirely above the level 
of statesmen who live for the present. The audience 
was chiefly composed of Virginians. On the fourth of 

259 



William July in the city of Washington you would not expect to 
Everett have any but a Virginia and Maryland audience such 
as gathered on that occasion to listen to him. He took 
up his favorite theme, the sin of abandoning the Union. 
He talked to the representatives of Virginia, those on 
the James River, and those beyond the Blue Ridge, and 
then he spoke to those who live beyond the Allegheny 
and warned them of the evils of breaking up the Union. 
He said — I have to quote from memory — I have not 
studied it in the book — I may say as Lord ]\Iansfield 
did on a similar occasion, " I have consulted no books, 
indeed I have no books to consult," — but Mr. Webster 
said, " Do you think, ye men of Western Virginia, that 
you can remain part and parcel of Virginia a month after 
Virginia has ceased to be part and parcel of the United 
States?" Who else in 185 1 thought that in 1S61 the 
northwestern counties of Virginia would be cut off and 
become a separate state in consequence of the secession 
of old Virginia? It was his vision, but it was his re- 
vealed vision, his inspired vision, that told him that if 
the South tried to break from the North the line of cleav- 
age would run through the Old Dominion itself, and 
that the North would gain those that the South had held 
for her own and never could get back after the original 
and terrible mistake. Here we have him a peacemaker 
with foreign nations, a prophet to his own, never for- 
getting to maintain the honor of his countr}- in irresist- 
ible argument, never forgetting to hold out the hand of 
peace to our cousins across the w^ater, to our brothers 
among ourselves; and, surely what greater service than 
that of the peacemaker and the prophet could any states- 



260 



man render to the country of his choice? William 

It is time for me to close, sir, but I wish with your Everett 
permission to close with offering a sentiment which 
though not directly appropriate to Mr. Webster is 
surely never inappropriate in speaking of him and 
speaking of Dartmouth College. Innnediately after 
Mr. Webster had gone to his grave, Dartmouth College 
held, in the year 1853, a solemn commemoration of his 
connection with her, and on that occasion a eulogy was 
delivered by that son of Dartmouth College who 
rivalled Mr. Webster as forensic orator and might have 
rivalled him as senatorial orator if he had not just 
touched the cup of senatorial greatness and then let it 
pass from his lips. On that occasion there was a vin- 
dication of Mr. Webster's position in 1850 which is 
utterly unanswerable. I offer you as a sentiment, sir, 
at your Webster commemoration: — 

"The memory of Rufus Choate, the friend, the 
follower, the eulogist of Daniel Webster ; Dartmouth 
owes him an incalculable debt and among its items will 
dwell with peculiar gratitude on that discourse which 
demonstrated that, as Webster's political sagacity was 
beyond the criticism of emulous rivals, so his political 
morality was beyond the cavil of narrow minded cen- 



sors." 



President Tucker : In a letter recently received 
reviving some reminiscences of his boyhood I note this 
passage : ' ' The first time I ever fired a gun was at 
Sandwich in September, 1826. The gentlemen of the 
party had returned from shooting with their fowling 
pieces loaded and called upon us boys to fire them. I 

261 



The think on that occasion I fired ^Nlr. Webster's." The 

President writer of this letter might have added that he has never 

of the since fired guns of any less calibre. I have the pleasure 

College to introduce to you the Reverend Doctor Edward 

Everett Hale. 



SpeecH of tHe Revereiid Edward 
Everett Hale, D.D., LL. D. 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — 

AM heartily indebted to my hosts for their invi- 
tation to be present on this occasion. The oc- 
casion has proved itself not simply one of pride 



■^^ 



I 



iio^yjst 



and congratulation among the friends of ]\Ir. Webster 
and the College, but one of historical importance as 
well. 

For myself, my right to speak rests wholly upon 
the memories which a child, who became a big boy, who 
became a young man, and who was thirty years old 
when Mr. Webster died, has of the kindness which 
a great man can show to a very young friend. From 
the moment when Mr. Webster removed to Bos- 
ton in 1817, he and my father were intimate friends. I 
have a fancy, indeed, that they had first met in the 
charming society of Exeter. Exeter is a place of 
which I always speak with tenderness and regard, 
because if my father had not been the mathematical 
preceptor at Exeter, he would never have met my 
mother and in that case I do not know where I should 
be to-day. Mr. Webster had established his brother, 
Ezekiel, in a school in Boston while he was himself 
studying law in Christopher Gore's office. I think 

262 



that my father and Mr. Edward Everett relieved Mr. Edward 
Ezekiel Webster in that school at different times when Everett 
he was not well. I may say in passing that that was "^'^ 
the sort of men who were schoolmasters before the in- 
ventions of modern machinery. 

Of course their children were intimate friends. 
Edward Webster, the second son of him whom we 
celebrate, only six months older than I, was my school- 
mate till we were twelve years old. We struck with 
the same bat at the same ball : we drove our hoops side 
by side : we made the same mistakes over the same 
fable of Phaedms. If we were in the house, it was his 
father's house or my father's house. Almost the 
earliest thing I remember was a September visit to the 
Cape in 1826, when Mr. Webster and Judge Story and 
Judge Fay and my father went down to the Cape for 
some shooting. The ladies and children of the families 
went with them, and great was my pride when at the 
modest age of four years I was permitted to discharge 
one of the guns at an unoffending shingle. Mr. Web- 
ster was very fond of children and got along excellently 
well with them. I am always proud to tell this story of 
a child's game of speculation or commerce at which at 
some birthday party w^e were all playing in his own 
library. The great library table was cleared for us, and, 
as it happened, I sat by ]\Ir. W^ebster's side. In the 
exigencies of the game, perhaps from my own impru- 
dent playing, I had lost all my ivory counters, and I 
cried out, " I have nothing left. Have I no friend who 
will lend to me ?" With perfectly characteristic gen- 
erosity, Mr. Webster pushed half his stock in front of 
me and said, " Edward, as long as I live you shall never 

263 



Edward say you have not a friend." I was a child, but I 

Everett treasured the words and they always proved true. 

Hale Senator Lodge may well express his surprise that 

any one who knew IMr. Webster at all thought he had 

no sense of humor. His humor cropped out always 

when he was at ease. In those davs of his vouneer 

practice, he was sitting in the Dedhani Court House 

when a murder trial was going on. He may have been 

one of the counsel, I do not know. He condensed the 

testimony in these lines, which are gruesome enough, 

but show his ready and easy tact in versification : 

" There was blood on the door, 
There was blood on the floor, 
There was blood on the kitchen stair, 
And all in the cracks 
Of the murderer's axe 
There was clotted blood and hair." 

I cannot dissect his contribution, but I have a 

child's poem which he and some of the other lawyers 

wrote with my father and mother for me, to entertain 

me in sickness. It was the trial of the sparrow for the 

murder of cock robin. I have always guessed that Mr. 

Webster furnished these lines, because they are the 

best in the little poem and because they are such good 

law : 

"The judge charged the jury 
For an hour and a quarter ; 
He spoke first of murder 
And then of manslaughter. 

"He stated that malice 
Was the essence of crime, 
And that this was too clear 
To take up their time ; 

"That if the defendant, 
When his arrow he hurled, 

264 



Had acted from malice Edward 

Against the whole world, Everett 

"And cared not who suffered, Halc 

So he had his sport, 
That then he deserved 
The worst sentence of Court." 

It has not seemed to me that enous^h has been said 
of the wide range of observation, of reading, of conversa- 
tion, and, therefore, of information which went with 
the tireless activity of an uneqnalled mind. He would 
talk of Greek history, he would discuss the letters of 
Linnaeus as easily as he might tell an anecdote of John 
Adams, or laugh at an absurdity of Lord Eldon. He 
worked very easily, so easily that I have heard men 
speak of his leisure as if it were affected leisure. 
This does not seem to me fair. He seemed to be ready 
to discuss the accuracy of Pope's translation of Homer, 
and he was ready. He was ready, because that morn- 
ing at half-past five he had lighted the kindlings in his 
own grate, had been at his desk at six, and when the 
family met at breakfast he had already finished the im- 
portant part of the work of the day. 

I would gladly speak of the devout and distinctly 
spiritual element in Mr. Webster's power. I would 
like to say a word in condemnation of the preposterous 
imputation that he was intemperate in his appetites. 
But on these matters I am sure that full justice will be 
done him by history. 



President Tucker : If we pass from personal remi- 
niscences of Mr. Webster to his political inheritance, to 
whom shall we turn with one accord except to the 
senior Senator from IMassachusetts — Senator Hoar. 

265 



George »SpeecK of tHe Honorable George 
Frisbie Frisbie Hoar. LL. D. 



Ho 



ar 



Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — 

OW many men have there been in this country 
whose college would celebrate their taking their 
degree one hundred years afterward, or fifty 



H 



years after they died ? It might have been done for 
Washington and Lincoln. But they were not college 
men. It might have been done for Hamilton or Jeffer- 
son. But neither Hamilton or Jefferson got through 
college, and Jefferson was not in general a favorite with 
college men. I believe Bowdoin will do it for Long- 
fellow, and I believe Harvard will do it for Emerson. I 
cannot think of any other. Yet no man will doubt the 
absolute fitness of the ceremonial of to-day. 

Daniel Webster died under a cloud of obloquy. He 
had deeply offended the North, and he had not won the 
South. He had offended his own state, which had so 
honored and loved him. The ordinary political antago- 
nisms, always bitter, bitter now, were bitter in his time 
to a degree we can hardly comprehend now. He had 
pained and grieved the conscience of his country. He 
was held for a time to be untrue to liberty. I suppose 
the contemporary judgment when he died was that of 
Theodore Parker, rather than that of Choate or of 
Everett. 

Ihit now few men can be found anywhere who think 
otherwise than kindly and lovingly of this illustrious 
son of Dartmouth. We have had fifty years to think of 
it. If the republic abide, his name and fame will abide 
with it. If the republic tlie, his name and fame shall 

266 



be inseparably intertwined with its memory, as the fame George 
of Pericles is intertwined with that of Athens. Frisbie 

The wisest and best men are likely to differ most Hoar 
sharply in applying what seem the simplest and clearest 
principles of morals and dnty and political liberty to the 
conduct of states, as they differ most sharply as to the 
creeds of religious sects, and the man who is most 
positive is most likely to be wrong. The moral is not 
that good men should abate in their zeal for righteous- 
ness or liberty, but only that they should abate in the 
bitterness of their judgments of others with whom 
they differ. 

We have learned, nearly all of us, that the things 
about which honest and brave and patriotic men are 
most likely to differ and to impute bad motives and 
inconsistencies to each other, are those which seem to 
them the plainest principles and the clearest maxims of 
public liberty, or the most express and unmistakable 
mandates of religion. 

Each man has given to him his own light. He is 
a laggard or a dastard if he do not follow it. But he 
is nowhere commanded to sit in judgment on the motives 
of other men. On the contrary, the divine command 
is, "Judge not," and the punishment for disobedience 
to that command is that you are to be treated as you 
treat other men, and that the measure you mete shall 
be measured to you again. 

In doing justice to him, let us do justice to the men 
who condemned him. Those of us who thought as I 
thought, and as I now think, the counsel he gave his 
countrymen in regard to the Compromise Measures, in 
conflict with the great mandate of justice and of consti- 

267 



George tutional liberty and iu conflict with the doctrine he had 
^^°^^ taught his "countrymen throughout his life, may still 
°^' bring their tribute of honor to his memory, as Whittier, 
who had written Ichabod brought his imperishable trib- 
ute of affection and honor, which, alas ! was never 
placed on the brow of Webster, but only laid on his 
grave. 

I have been asked to speak of Mr. Webster as a 
Senator. He was, beyond doubt, the foremost of 
American Senators. When we think of the Senate 
Chamber, we think of him as its principal figure and or- 
nament. Yet he did much less than many other men to 
influence the action of the Senate. In his time, the 
Senate, more than before or since, might have been de- 
scribed as a meeting of the Ambassadors of States. Its 
members met with minds made up and did not expect 
to convince one another. He spoke, as his successor 
said he did, "as from a pulpit with a lofty sounding- 
board," with the whole people for his congregation. 

His place in history is that of a public teacher, 
guiding the thought and inspiring the emotions of his 
countrymen when the issues on which hung the fate of 
the republic were being determined. For this function 
he was fitted alike by his intellect and his heart. He 
was a great reasoner, a great orator, and a great lover. 
He had the qualities which belong to humanity, by 
which its hold, half on earth and half on heaven, is 
maintained. 

Matthew Arnold said that our American public men 

lacked distinction. He allowed that quality to Grant, 

though he could not find it in Abraham Lincoln. If he 

did not find it in Webster, the cultured and fastidious 

268 



Englishman would probably have denied it to the Apollo George 
Belvedere, or the Phidian Jove, or the great god Pan. Frisbic 

Why, the draymen in London turned to look after °*' 
him in the streets ! Sidney Smith said he was a steam 
engine in breeches. He moved to an unwonted admira- 
tion the bitter cynicism of Carlyle. If ever being walked 
the earth clad in the panoply of an imperial manhood, 
it was Daniel Webster. If ever being trod the earth of 
whom the Greek or Roman fable would have made a 
demi-god, it was this child of the New Hampshire farm- 
house. Even when his foes would describe him, at 
the time when political hatred was most bitter, they 
had to borrow Milton's lofty imagery, as he pictures the 
fallen angels gathered in their awful Senate Chamber. 

He was a great lover. Was there ever a man who 
loved his country, or who loved his college, or who loved 
his father and his brother and his children, and his 
neighbors and friends, who loved the old scenes over 
which his mother had led his boyish feet, or where he 
dwelt with his neighbors by mountain or shore, as 
Daniel Webster loved them ? 

There was never a child entered his presence that 
did not remember to his dying day the kindly and 
tender look that came from the deep eyes, and the win- 
ning and beautiful smile that lit up the melancholy of 
the grave face, no matter what care might be weighing 
upon the brow. 

His sentences dwell and abide with us like the 
Psalms of David or the songs of Burns. Bright boys 
repeat them over and over to themselves. The fisher- 
man on the boat thinks of them, and the sailor at the 
helm, and the farmer as he holds the plow. They come 

269 



George up in the mind of the soldier as he goes into battle, and 
Frisbie the patriot on his dying bed. 
Hoar When New Hampshire, a little while ago, placed his 

statue in the Capitol, I had something to do with the 
transaction. Just afterward, 1 got two letters from 
brave soldiers of the Civil War. One of them says : 
"In the forlorn hope at Port Hudson, beaten back, we 
sought the refuge of the scraggy brushes, and then, on 
that cloudless afternoon, I saw the flag of our regiment, 
and his undying peroration returned to my mind. Who 
can say how much that speech shotted our guns?" 
The other told me that he was stationed one night on 
picket duty, where two sentinels in succession had just 
before been shot down. As he marched up and down in 
the loneliness of the night, thinking that at any time 
his death-shot might ring out from the thicket, he kept 
up his courage by repeating to himself, over and over 
and over again, the closing passage of the reply to 
Hayne, which he had got by heart in his boyhood. 

The same thoughts have been uttered before and 
since by other orators. Other men have appealed to 
the same emotion. Other men have spoken to the same 
people, but only to meet the fate of him who tried to 
rival the inimitable thunderbolt and storm with sound- 
ing of brass and trampling of the feet of horses. 
^^Qui nimbus et non iniitahile fulnien 
Acre et cornipedum pulsu simularet equoruw.'" 
It is said that other countries are founded upon 
force ; that in the end they rest upon the bayonet and 
the cannon. I am not sure that this theory will bear 
the light of careful consideration. But however that 
may be, the Republic is founded upon ideas. When 

270 



those ideas lose their power over the minds and hearts George 
of the people, the Republic will come to an end. It is Frisbic 
the fortune of Daniel Webster, as of no other man ex- Hoar 
cept Jefferson, that the great ideas which lie at the foun- 
dation of the Republic clothe themselves to every man's 
understanding in his language, and rest for their sanc- 
tion and vindication upon his argument. 

In general, our knowledge of history is like our 
memory of a journey in a foreign land. We remember 
vividly a few great pictures in great galleries. We think 
of a few landscapes, and, perhaps, the forms and faces of 
a few famous men. If we met them and talked with 
them, we remember what they said. Everything else 
is blurred and indistinct. So history is made up to us 
of a few memorable scenes, a few human figures, or a 
few sentences that have fallen from some great actor on 
a great occasion. We know our own history as well as 
any people on the face of the earth. Yet still what I 
have said is true of us. To every American, certainly 
to every son of New Bugland, to blot out the figure of 
Daniel Webster from our history, from the day Wash- 
ington died till the day Lincoln took the oath of office, 
would be like cutting out the figure of the Virgin Mary 
from Raphael's great painting at Dresden. How it 
mingles with every great event and in every historic 
spot ! To the lover of constitutional liberty, there is 
nothing like the reply to Hayne since Pericles died, save 
only the dying speech of Chatham, and that of Patrick 
Henry at Williamsburg. There is nothing like it since, 
save Lincoln's speech at Gettysburg. We cannot think 
of the Senate Chamber without him. We cannot think 
of the Supreme Court without him. We cannot think 

271 



George of Dartmouth College without him. We cannot think 
rnsbie Qf paneuil Hall without him. We cannot think of Bos- 
""*' ton, or Concord, or Lexington, or Bunker Hill, without 
him. We cannot think of New Hampshire without 
him. We cannot think of Massachusetts without him. 
We cannot think of America without him. We cannot 
think of the Constitution or of the Union without him. 
His figure naturally belongs to and mingles with all 
great scenes and great places which belong to liberty. 
Emerson said his presence would have been enough, 
even had he refrained from speech, when the monument 
at Bunker Hill was dedicated. There was the monu- 
ment, and there was Webster. 

There is no judgment of any court, save Marshall's, 
more weighty, — I am afraid there is none more likely to 
be of permanent authority, — than the recorded opinions 
of Webster on Constitutional Law. There is nothing 
in our forensic literature more likely to endure than his 
speeches. 

He not only seemed to give a new nobility to what 
is noble and great, but he ennobled and made great the 
common scenes of common life with which he mingled. 
I venture to say that every man now living, or every 
man who ever did live, who saw Webster, if it were but 
as he passed in the street, remembered it freshly ever 
afterward, as an indelible memory of life. Whether it 
were in the schoolroom at Exeter, or the classroom at 
Dartmouth, or the quiet visit at some neighbor's home, 
or in some great natural scene, or some great public 
gathering by the seashore, or on the mountain, or in the 
college hall, or in the court room, or in the Senate Cham- 



272 



ber, he is still everywhere the foremost figure and is in- George 
separably blended with the scene. Frisbie 



President Tucker : I am told that it is contrary 
to the traditions of the Supreme Court of the United 
States that the Chief-Justice should speak in any official 
or semi-official way on general public occasions. I beg 
the Chief-Justice of the United States, if hampered by 
the traditions of the Court, to remember that he is now 
in his ancestral home and that he is enjoying the privacy 
of the occasion. 



Hoa 



r 




■^l 



mi 



Speeds of Cl\ief-J\istice Melville 
Westom Fuller, LL. D. 

Mr. President and Brethren : — 

T gives me great pleasure to acknowledge the cor- 
dial welcome you have extended to me, but in 
accepting the kind invitation of your committee 
to be present at this commemoration I had no intention 
of delivering an address or making any extended re- 
marks. I adhere in that respect to the general rule, 
which, as I understand it, has been observed by my il- 
lustrious predecessors, not meaning by the remark to 
include my associates on the bench. All will admit 
that the rule is an exceedingly salutary one to be ob- 
served at one o'clock at night. But some words I will 
add, in respect of certain special considerations, which 
have moved me to be with you. I say special consid- 
erations, for the desire to participate in this celebration 
needs no explanation. 

As the president told you this morning, my father's 
father and my mother's father were both graduates of 

273 



Melville Dartmouth, and both in College with Mr. Webster. 

Weston Chief-Justice Weston graduated two years later. Henry 
roller w. Fuller was his classmate, or as Mr. Webster him- 
self put it, his " brother student, brother collegemate 
brother classmate, brother Frater, brother Adelphian, 
and friend." Mr. Webster's letters to that classmate 
are heirlooms in the family and they amply illustrate 
the charming phase of Mr. Webster's character to which 
Dr. Hale has referred. In one of them he gives the 
process of reasoning- by which the conclusion is reached 
that Daniel Webster is the handsomest man in New 
England. As I remember it, it ran something like this: 
That Boston was the handsomest town in New England; 
that Christopher Gore's ofhce was the handsomest office 
in Boston ; and that Daniel Webster was the handsom- 
est man in Christopher Gore's office. Argal, that Dan- 
iel Webster was the handsomest man in New England. 
In another he writes that he has heard from Davis that 
everything is going on finely at Hanover, pumpkin pie 
and professors plenty ; wheat and poetry a good deal 
blasted ; girls and ginger-bread as sweet as ever ; and 
in another he compares life to a contra-dance in which 
he thinks .somehow he has " slipped a foot." Yon can 
readily understand the influence which such recollec- 
tions, coupled with traditions of the relations between 
the two friends, naturally had upon me on receiving the 
invitation of your committee. But there was another 
and a weightier cause that impelled me, a sense of duty 
to testify by my personal attendance to the tie that binds 
the memory of this great minister of justice to the court, 
in aid of whose labors some of the most splendid mani- 
festations of his intellectual power were exhibited. It 

274 



is impossible to overestimate the support that the court Melville 
derives from the bar, and in Mr. Webster's aro;uments Weston 
fidelity to the court is as conspicuous as fidelity to his Fuller 
client. It was not client first, and conscience after- 
wards, but duty to both together, one and inseparable. 
And this was so notwithstanding that on occa.sion he 
departed from the logical line of his contention to in- 
dulge in outbursts of wonderful and apparently spon- 
taneous eloquence. I should like to go further and to 
dwell on the long line of cases in which ]\Ir. Webster's 
work contributed so much to strengthen and solidify 
our institutions, and "to clear the foundations, 
strengthen the pillars, and raise the august dome of the 
Temple of Justice still higher in the skies." But I for- 
bear in deference to the precedent to which I have al- 
luded. 

Nearly forty-nine years ago, an undergraduate on 
leave of absence for the purpose, I attended the funeral 
of Mr. Webster at Marshfield. The beauty of that Octo- 
ber day ; the majestic aspect of the great lawyer and 
advocate, statesman and orator, as he lay in his accus- 
tomed habiliments under the spreading branches of a 
beautiful tree in front of the mansion ; and the v/alk of 
neighbors and friends, distinguished personages, and 
others, over the fields to the grave, are still vivid in my 
memory. As a youth I paid that tribute to Daniel 
Webster, an incident quite unimportant save to the boy 
himself. And I repeat it now after the lapse of nearly 
fifty years, with the added significance involved in the 
office I hold, whose incumbent if another than myself 
would have been fully justified, as I am, in bearing wit- 
ness as such, to the immortality of a fame so connected 

275 



Melville with the administration of justice, and with the vindica- 

Weston tion of liberty as the creature of law, that, to use his 

Fuller own language, it "is and must be as durable as the frame 

of human society 



) ) 



President Tucker : Brethren, it remains for me 
only while you are standing on the eve of your going, 
to return the thanks of Dartmouth College to our dis- 
tinguished guests who have honored us by their words 
and by their presence and to announce that the Webster 
Centennial is closed. 



276 



'^he Appendix u^ j0^ 



effect of iKe DartmoutH Colleg'e 
Case as a Precedent.* 

^y the Honorable cAlfred Russell, LL, D., '50, 
T was charged, and doubtless firmly believed, by 
the statesmen and philosophers of the old world, 



I 



that property would not be safe under a govern- 
ment like ours, derisively called by Thomas Carlyle 
"anarchy plus a street constable." But the College 
Case so construed and applied a provision of our Federal 
Constitution as to render vested rights, of a corporate 
character, more secure here than in Europe. 

In the mother country, where the power of Parlia- 
ment is not limited by a written constitution, that body 
has introduced into the universities, and other endowed 
charities, changes greater than the state sought to im- 
pose upon the college, and has deprived business cor- 
porations of their franchises as a matter of mere legisla- 
tive discretion, as in the noteworthy case of the East 
India Company, in 1858, which governed millions of 
people. 

By the original College charter from the king, 
granted in 1769, twelve persons therein named were in- 

*The regret caused by the absence of Mr. Russell from the ban- 
quet and the loss of the speech which he would have made is in part 
compensated for by this article which is inserted by permission. The 
paper is of special value as presenting an aspect of the Dartmouth 
College Case not otherwise treated in the addresses or speeches of 
this volume. 

279 



The corporated by the name of "The Trustees of Dartmouth 
Appendix College," and to tliem and their successors the usual 
corporate privileges and powers were granted, among 
which was authority to govern the College and fill all 
vacancies in their own body. By acts of the Legisla- 
ture of New Hampshire, passed in 1816, the charter 
was amended, the number of trustees increased to twenty- 
one, the appointment of the additional members vested 
in the executive of the state, and a Board of Overseers, 
consisting of twenty-five persons, created, with power 
to inspect and control the most important acts of the 
trustees. The President of the Senate, the Speaker of 
the House of Representatives of New Hampshire, and 
the Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of Vermont, for 
the time being, were to be members "ex officio"; and 
the Board was to be completed by the Governor and 
Council of New Hampshire, who were also empowered 
to fill all vacancies which might occur. A majority of 
the trustees of the College refused to accept this 
amended charter, and brought suit for the corporate 
property, which was in the possession of a person hold- 
ing by authority of the acts of the Legislature. 

The Superior Court of Judicature of New Hamp- 
shire sustained the legislation of the State. Upon re- 
view by the Federal Supreme Court, it was said that 
the ingredients of a contract are parties, consent, con- 
sideration and obligation ; that the case presented all 
these ; that the parties were the king and the donees of 
the powers and privileges conferred ; that consent was 
shown by what they did ; that the considerations were 
the investments of moneys for the purpose of the foun- 
dation, the public benefits expected to accrue, and the 

250 



implied undertaking of the corporation faithfully to The 
fulfill the duties with which it was charged ; that the Appendix 
obligation was to do the latter under the penalty of 
forfeiture for non-user or mis-user ; that on the part 
of the king there was an implied obligation that the 
life of the compact should be subject to no other 
contingency. The Court, therefore, declared the 
charter to possess all the elements of a contract, within 
the meaning of Article i. Section lo, of the Constitu- 
tion, ordaining that no state shall pass any law impair- 
ing the obligations of contracts. It was consequently 
ruled that the State laws changing the charter without 
the consent of the corporation were repugnant to the 
Federal Constitution, the supreme law of the land, bind- 
ing the judges in every state, and the judgment of the 
State Court was reversed and annulled. 

During the eighty years since this decision, made 
in 1819, the Federal Supreme Court has often said that 
the question decided in the College Case has been 
considered as finally settled in the jurisprudence of the 
entire country ; that murmurs of doubt and dissatisfac- 
tion are occasionally heard, but that there has been no 
re-argument in that Court and that none has ever been 
asked for. The Court has also said that the decision 
must be regarded as imbedded in the Constitution itself, 
and that it has been re-aflfirmed and applied so often as 
to have become established as a canon of American juris- 
prudence. 

The adoption of the fourteenth amendment, in 
1868, amounted to a solemn approval of the decision by 
the states themselves, and extended the guardianship 



281 



^"^ of the Federal Constitution over all other rights within 
Appendix ^^^ states, as well as contracts. 

IMany hundreds of subsequent cases in both Federal 
and State Courts have established the law, in conform- 
ity with the College Case, that wherever rights have 
been acquired by virtue of a corporate charter, such 
rights, so far as necessary to the complete enjoyment of 
the main object of the grant, are contracts and beyond 
the reach of legislation, unless the express power of 
amendment, alteration or repeal has been reserved by 
the state granting the charter. 

The College Case has justly been regarded as a 
bulwark of private property, and the numerous decis- 
ions based upon it, setting aside acts of the state legis- 
latures, have been of inestimable benefit. The aston- 
ishing inventions which have greatly increased the busi- 
ness of transportation and interstate commerce have 
been steadily adjudicated upon according to the prin- 
ciple of the College Case, and this course of adjudication 
has been largely the source of the success of the great 
enterprises which have so much benefited the country. 

In the intervening time, important modifications of 
the Case have been made. Our system of judiciary law 
has the advantage that its elasticity enables those who 
administer it to adapt it to the varying conditions of 
the successive generations to whom it is immediately 
applied. The America of 1901 is ver}- different from 
the America of 181 9. The requirements and habits, 
wants, usages, and interests of the different stages of 
time elapsing since the decision have, indeed, led to 
modifications of the decision, but its principle is ab- 
solutely untouched, and always will be. Twenty years 

282 



after the decision it was determined in the Charles The 
River Bridge Case that an exclusive right to enjoy a Appendix 
franchise can never be presumed, and that, unless the 
charter contains words of exclusion, it is no impairment 
of the grant, under the College Case, to permit another 
to do the same thing, although the value'of the franchise 
to the first grantee may be wholly destroyed. Such is 
tbe law to-day. Forty years after- the Bridge Case came 
the so-called Granger Cases, holding that all private 
property, corporate or not, which is affected with a pub- 
lic use, is subject to the affirmative right of the State 
Legislature to fix the charges for the use of such prop- 
erty ; and this principle was applied to the western 
grain elevators and grain conveying railroads. These 
cases were the outgrowth of a widely diffused feeling of 
apprehension that the accumulation of wealth was too 
much protected by the principle of the College Case. 
Twenty years after the Granger Cases the College Case 
came again under review in the so-called Nebraska Case 
and kindred cases, establishing that there is implied in 
the franchise of a carrying corporation a grant of a con- 
tract right to collect such tolls as will enable the com- 
pany to operate and return a profit to the investors, and 
that the reasonableness of rates of carriage, fixed by 
the Legislature under the Granger Cases, may be re- 
viewed by the courts. These cases grew out of the 
portentous fact that the states, acting on the principle 
of the Granger Cases, were passing laws which were de- 
stroying the value of railroad property. 

The Federal Supreme Court has had, perhaps, 
more frequent occasion to re-affirm the principle of the 
College Case in cases respecting the power of taxation 

283 



■^"^ than in any other ; and, in a long series of decisions, 
Appendix j^^g j^^j^^ ^^^^ ^ provision in a charter imposing certain 
taxes in lieu of all other taxes or of all taxes, to which 
the company or stockholders therein would be subject, 
is impaired by legislation raising the rate of taxation, 
or imposing taxes other than those specified in the char- 
ter ; and this doctrine has been strictly adhered to up 
to the present time. 

Within the same principle, derived from the Col- 
lege Case as limited by the Bridge Case, are grants of an 
exclusive right to supply gas, or water, to a municipal- 
ity, or to occupy its streets for railway purposes. 

So we see that the principles of the College Case, 
arising concerning the privileges of an ancient institu- 
tion for the preservation of learning and religion, has 
not only been a shield and buckler for those transcendent 
interests of our country, but has been carried, in a most 
unforeseen way, into the domain of the vast business 
concerns of continental America. The wealth of our 
corporations equals in value four-fifths of the entire 
property of the country. They do business with the 
citizens of every state, and with foreign nations, and in 
their enormous transactions and litig;ations, it is the 
aegis of the College Case which is held over them, a sure 
protection. 

It may be said, in conclusion, that the effect of the 
College Case as a precedent has been the creation of the 
whole body of American doctrine regarding vested rights, 
as applied to the charters of corporations. This doc- 
trine was born of the College Case, and lives, moves, 
and has its being in it, and always will as long as our 
government endures. This case has been cited in sub- 

284 



sequent judicial opinions more times than any other case The 

in the "American Reports," — about nine hundred Appendix 

and seventy times ! 



Letter from Daniel Webster to 
Horatio G. Cilley, E-sq\iire.* 

Washington, Sunday Evening, 

February 25, 1838. 
My Dear Sir : — 

EFORE this reaches you, you will probably have 
heard of the death of your Nephew, the Hon'ble 
]\Ir. Cilley, member of the House of Represen- 
tatives from the State of Maine. 

This melancholy event was the result of a Duel, 
fought yesterday afternoon, between him and the Hon- 
'ble Air. Graves, a member of the same House of 
Congress, from the State of Kentucky. 

I have no authentic information of the circum- 
stance which led to the contest, nor of those which 
accompanied it. The friends of the Parties will no 
doubt immediately lay before the public statements of 
such particulars as they may suppose friends may 
desire naturally to be informed of. The main object of 
this letter, is to express my commiseration with the 
numerous branches of your family, with whom I have 
been more or less acquainted, at this afflicting occur- 
rence. ]\Ir. Cilley himself I had not known much. He 

*This letter was read at the meeting in the Old Chapel on Wednes- 
day afternoon, and is referred to on page 188 of this volume. As it 
was received too late for publication in the body of the book, it is in- 
serted here. 

285 



The had so recently become a member of Congress, that our 
Appendix acquaintance was slight. I had heard him speak in his 
place, once or twice, however, and I thought he spoke 
with ability. But having known his father, and most 
of his uncles, either in public or private life, and hav- 
ing had some little acquaintance with his relatives, of 
his own generation, I have felt it a kind of duty to ex- 
press toward them condolence, and commiseration, and 
I ask you to communicate these sentiments, as you may 
meet with the members of the family, whom I know. 

The members of the Delegation from ]\Iaine, in 
both Houses, all of whom are deeply affected by the 
event, will do all that remains to be done. The 
funeral will probably be attended to-morrow. How 
melancholy it is. My Dear Sir, that neither law nor 
religion, nor both, can check the prevalence, in society, 
of the practice of private combat! 

With friendly regard. 
Yours, 

Danl. Webster. 
Horatio G. Cilley, Esq., 

Deerfield, 

N. Hamp. 



286 



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for Dartmouth College, at the Dartmouth Press, 
Hanover, New Hampshire, MCMII J- J- ^ J- J- 



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